


Better Elsewhere

by veronamay



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Genie/Djinn, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Dean in Denial, F/M, Infidelity, M/M, Medicinal Drug Use, Mental Institutions, Monster of the Week, Psychological Horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-07-14
Updated: 2008-07-14
Packaged: 2018-01-12 15:36:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 26,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1190469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/veronamay/pseuds/veronamay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An alternate version of 2x20, where Sam is caught in the djinn's spell ... and things are not what you'd expect. Some things never change, though: Dean still wants to save people, Sam's still hunting things, and at the end of it all family business is the only thing that matters.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **heidi8's master post:** [here](http://heidi8.livejournal.com/925099.html)

PROLOGUE: HERE

Dean comes out of the shower in nothing but a towel, stray drops of water running down his chest.

"Got any leads?" he says, leaning over Sam's shoulder, dripping on his shirt. Sam grits his teeth and stares at the laptop until his eyes tear up.

"There's a stretch of industrial warehousing here that might be what we're looking for," he replies, pointing to the Google Maps search results. "It's a pretty big area, though. It's gonna take a while to check."

"Awesome. Lots of large echoing spaces and no way to tell when the djinn's gonna pop up in our faces." Dean makes a disgusted noise, twitching his shoulders as if shaking off an unwelcome touch. "Like a damn jack in the box. Man, I hate those things."

"Me too," Sam murmurs.

He's not really concentrating on the conversation anymore. Dean's warm and wet and almost naked behind him, fresh from his shower, and Sam can smell Irish Spring and bay rum on his skin. The scent calls up his dream from the night before, the hazy sensation of Dean all around him, pressing him down, strong hand on the back of Sam's neck pushing him deep into the pillows. He not-remembers the feel of Dean's knee in his back, the heat and weight of him and the way he'd melted under Dean's hands, malleable and compliant. Dean's teeth in his shoulder, nails digging in and catching under his hair, quick harsh breaths in his ear while Dean's other hand travelled down.

Sam's cock hardens reflexively. It feels like he's always wanted Dean; even when he had Jessica, even while he was making plans for law school and graduate programs and looking at diamond rings, it was an unacknowledged truth that Dean would always come first. The only reason he chose law in the first place was because he thought it might help Dean; just because he didn't want to hunt didn't mean he couldn't be useful. As far back as he can remember he's been focused on Dean: protector, teacher, annoying older brother, and now partner in every sense of the word.

Well, almost.

Sam leans back a little, brings their bodies into full contact. He feels Dean draw in a slow, shaky breath, a whisper of touch passes over his hair, and for a single glorious moment he thinks, _Finally, God, yes_.

"Cut it out, Sam."

Sour disappointment floods his mouth when Dean steps away. Sam slumps in his chair for a moment, listening to the undertones of Dean's refusal lingering in the air.

They don't talk about it, but he wants to. Needs to, if he can't do anything about it. He can't live in Dean's type of denial; he wants to get it all out there in the open, put the subject to bed once and for all. The frustration of staying silent is like an itch all over his body, right under the skin, one he wants to scratch until his nails come away bloody. Sam's endured it for so long, thinking of Dean these days is equal parts longing and resentment and pain.

It's as much a surprise to himself as it is to Dean when he finally snaps.

"What is your problem?" he demands, turning around. "I know this--thing, whatever you want to call it, isn't just me. It can't be."

"Sorry, Sam," Dean replies, with not even a hint of a smile. "It really, really is."

Sam stares him down, searching for some chink in Dean's armour, some sign that he's lying through his teeth. He knows he's not alone in this. He's felt Dean's eyes on him too many times, had too many moments like the one just past to believe anymore that he's projecting. Dean's definitely on the same page; he's just not admitting it.

"Is it because of Dad?" Sam asks, spreading his hands in supplication. "Because Dad's gone, Dean. He's never gonna know. And you can't tell me you care what anyone else thinks."

"It's not Dad. It's not what people might think. It's because _I don't want to_ ," Dean growls, throwing his duffle bag on the bed. "And you shouldn't either," he goes on, more quietly. "Damn it, Sam, what the hell happened? When did you stop caring about being normal?"

"When a demon killed my girlfriend and then took my father's soul in exchange for my brother's life," Sam snaps back. "Normal's pretty much out of the picture after that, don't you think?"

"You can still have it," Dean insists. "The job, the Lexus, the cookie-cutter house in the suburbs. After we kill this demon--"

"I'm still gonna want you," Sam says baldly, and Dean's mouth snaps shut. Sam scrubs a hand through his hair and sighs. "I don't know when or how or why it started, okay? If I knew that, maybe I could've--but there's no going back. I can't stop it. I don't even want to anymore. I just want you."

"I can't," Dean whispers after a long moment. He sounds defeated. "I just--I can't, Sam."

Sam looks with raised eyebrows at the erection showing clearly beneath Dean's towel.

"Obviously," he says. "My mistake." He palms his cock, uncaring that Dean can see, grinding down to relieve the pressure. "You done with the bathroom?"

It's pretty clear what he's gonna do in there. A part of him feels ashamed for pushing like this, almost taunting, but the guilt pretty much stopped after the fifth time Dean made a move and then backflipped so fast Sam got whiplash. Now he just wants to get a reaction--any reaction.

Dean twitches, but stands well out of the way with a sweep of his arm.

"Knock yourself out," he invites, a pale shadow of his usual sarcastic tone.

Sam heads for the bathroom, hands on his belt; halfway there he strikes, reaches out and grabs Dean's shoulder, yanking hard. Dean stumbles, clutching at his towel, and Sam brings them so close together their noses touch. Then he's leaning in and kissing Dean, biting at his mouth hard and frantic, sucking on that lush bottom lip, using everything he's got to get Dean to open up and _break_ \--

Dean shoves him away roughly, following up with a solid left hook that catches him square on the jaw. Sam reels back more from shock than the impact of the punch, falling on his ass on the dirty motel carpet. He stares up at Dean in disbelief. His lip is stinging; he thinks Dean bit him.

"I said no," Dean snarls, eyes gone hard and cold. "You think that only counts for chicks?"

Sam scrambles to his feet and heads for the door without a word. His hands shake as he reaches into his pocket for the car keys; he'd gone out earlier for food and never gave them back. The Impala rumbles under him as he streaks out of the motel lot. He can hear Dean yelling behind him, but only vaguely, as if he's underwater. Everything's drowned out by white noise and a sense of desperation so strong it chokes him.

Dean starts calling his cell ten seconds later. Sam switches it off and throws it in the back seat. There's only one thing he's interested in talking to right now--and by 'talk to', he means 'kill'. If he can't have Dean, then he's gonna burn off his frustration some other way.

The lamb's blood is tucked away in the trunk, right next to his favourite silver knife. Sam pulls up a mental map of the warehouse district and starts at the eastern end, quartering the area.

Sam cools off pretty quickly once he's on the job. It's quiet out here, lonely; more than once he wishes he'd brought his phone with him, but he knows he'd only call Dean. He can wait to hear the earful Dean will lay on him when he gets back; no need to suffer it ahead of time. No need to go back to the constant grind of want and repression and bitterness just yet, either. The job is useful for relieving that pressure, at least.

He turns his mind to other things with an effort, running through a quick recap of the research they've been doing on this job. There wasn't much intel in Dad's journal, just a brief mention of djinn in passing connection to succubi. They've had to wade through dozens of esoteric texts to get an idea of what they're dealing with, and Sam's still not entirely sure they've got it right. Lamb's blood and a silver knife sounds very poetic, but he's brought along Dean's favourite sawed-off just in case.

Sam's kind of surprised they found any mention of the thing at all in Dad's journal. On the other hand, John Winchester was nothing if not a mythology packrat; he made a point of telling them there was no such thing as worthless information. The journal lists a lot of stuff merely in passing--everything from Tanzanian tribal beliefs to German vampire myths--without a lot of detail, but it's been a starting point for them more times than Sam can remember. He sometimes thinks of it as a mobile concise _Encyclopedia Mythica_. The thought makes him smile; it's followed by the ever-present ache of missing Dad, and the reflexive urge to seek out Dean for comfort. Sam sighs, quashes the impulse and moves on.

He searches for almost two hours and finds nothing except a bunch of empty blue barrels stacked incongruously in a corner of one warehouse, and a dozen crates of rubber ducks abandoned in another. The entire area seems to be deserted.

It's laughably anticlimactic in the end. Sam's stalking through the fourteenth building in his search, just about ready to call it a night and go back to the motel, when he sees a faint blue glow from the corner of his eye. That's all the warning he gets. The djinn bears down on him with eerie speed, shoving him into a wall, one hand circling his wrist with crushing pressure until Sam's nerves spasm.

He drops the knife.

The last thought Sam has as he's surrounded by cold blue-black darkness is, _Dean_.

* * *

ELSEWHERE

He gets the call in the middle of dinner, at the worst possible time. Then again, Dean thinks later, it was possibly the best time too--depending on your point of view.

He thinks about ignoring the shrill ringing of his cell, noticing the tight lines bracketing Cassie's mouth. Then it sinks in that it's the hospital calling--he can tell by the custom ringtone--and he's on his feet and across the room before he realises he's moved, the serious discussion about where this relationship is going, Dean slipping entirely from his mind.

"Hello?" Dean says, automatically dropping his voice and moving into the bedroom. He can feel Cassie's disapproval behind him, but it doesn't really register. All his attention is focused on the call.

"Mr Winchester? Dean Winchester?"

"Speaking." Dean doesn't recognise the voice, but it doesn't matter. "Did something happen to Sam?"

"I'm ... not sure," says the girl on the line, and Dean grits his teeth. "Dr Ellicott said maybe you should come down here, so I just thought ... I'm sorry--I'm new here, I don't know all the patients yet--"

"I'm on my way," Dean cuts in. "I'll be there in half an hour. Don't sedate him."

"I don't--" she begins, but Dean's not listening. He hangs up and shoves the phone in his pocket, shrugging into his coat on his way out to the living room.

"I have to go," he says, grabbing his keys off the end table near the door. "Something's up with Sam. I gotta get down there."

Cassie's still sitting at the table on the other side of the room, candlelight reflecting softly on her face. She doesn't answer, just takes a healthy swallow from her glass of cabernet.

"Cassie?" Dean looks up finally, sees her annoyance written plain across her face. "Did you hear me? I gotta go see Sam."

"So go," she snaps. "It's not like you need my permission."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Dean asks, irritation rising at this same old argument. "You know how Sam gets when he's upset. I have to go."

"Of course you do." Cassie sighs, anger turning to resignation. "I just ..." She raises one hand as if reaching out, then lets it drop. "If you cared half as much about this relationship as you do your brother, we wouldn't keep having this conversation."

Dean stares for a moment, unable to make sense of what she's saying. Sam's his brother. He can't ignore that, no matter how--disturbed--Sam is; in fact, he feels more responsible than ever while Sam's not well. Dean has to be there for him. Trying to compare Cassie and Sam just gives him a confused headache, and he wonders how women's minds even work.

"Can we talk about this later?" he says. "If I don't get down there soon they'll sedate him, and that always messes him up."

Cassie smiles, but it looks small and weary on her pretty face.

"Sure, Dean," she agrees. "We'll talk later. Go see your brother."

Dean goes over and drops a kiss on her forehead, but his mind's already at the hospital. Her shoulders slump as he leaves the apartment, but he doesn't notice.

* * *

It's a half hour drive to the hospital, but Dean puts his foot down a little and the Impala gets him there in twenty. He parks in one of the day admin's spots and straight-arms through the front doors into the reception area. Dr Ellicott's nowhere around, but Dean knows the way to Sam's room blindfolded.

He's only taken three steps into the hallway at his left when he hears Sam's voice, strident and panicked, echoing off the walls.

"What are you doing? Get the hell away from me!"

Dean swears under his breath and breaks into a run.

"Sam." Dr Ellicott sounds calm. "You know this is necessary. You're upsetting yourself and the other patients. This will calm you down."

Dean rounds the corner and arrives in the doorway just as Sam snarls, "I don't want to calm down." Then Sam looks up and sees him, and it's like someone's flipped a switch somewhere inside.

"Dean," Sam breathes, sinking back to the floor with naked relief on his face, and Dean feels like traitor and saviour together. "Dean, you have to get me out of here, please, you have to tell them--"

"Hey, hey, hey," Dean says, going over to him even though proximity is bad right now. "Sh, Sammy, c'mon. Settle down now, okay? It's fine, everything is fine."

He hates doing this. Every time Sam backslides, every time they change his meds or he refuses to take them or they just don't work, Dean has to come down here and see his little brother strapped to a bed or trussed up in a straitjacket, twisting and writhing and begging to be freed. It's the jacket this time, which means Sam's not violent, just upset. It's bad enough, though: Sam's not small, and Dean's seen what it takes to wrestle him into it. Has helped on occasion, which makes him hate the thing all the more. Sam looks so vulnerable wrapped up like an infant, eyes wide and confused as he stares up at Dean from the floor.

"Dean, what's wrong with you? You gotta listen to me," Sam's saying, trying clumsily to get to his feet. "This isn't real, it's a trick or something. We have to get out of here."

"Sh," Dean repeats automatically, laying a hand lightly on Sam's hair. Dr Ellicott makes a quiet noise of disapproval, but Dean doesn't give a fuck. Sam doesn't react anyway, except to shuffle closer, and Dean's okay with that.

He crouches down next to Sam on the floor, bringing their eyes level.

"Sammy, do you know where you are?" he asks, gentle.

Sam looks around, the confusion in his eyes growing deeper. Dean's heart sinks, clenches hard as he watches. This is bad.

"No," Sam admits slowly. "But--Dean, it doesn't matter. We have to go. Right now. This could be a trap, we--"

"It's not a trap, Sam." Dean strokes Sam's messy bangs away from his face, leaves his hand on that strong square jaw for a moment. "It's a hospital. You're sick, okay? You need to stay here and get better."

"Hospital?" Sam frowns and looks around again, his eyes clearing somewhat. "Yeah, I guess, but--what the hell, Dean? What's going on? Where's the Jeannie?"

Dean has no idea who Jeannie is. He looks over at Dr Ellicott, but the doc's face makes his own puzzlement clear. Another bad sign. If Sam's talking to people that aren't there, he's not just backsliding. He's getting worse.

"Jeannie's not here, Sam," he says carefully. "It's time for you to rest now, okay? Get some sleep, and things will be clearer in the morning."

He flicks a look at one of the beefy nurses standing guard by the door, the one holding the syringe. He's careful not to let Sam see the guy coming up behind him; Sam's strong even when he's confined, and Dean's seen him break limbs with just his body weight before. It makes him sick to have to keep tricking Sam like this; calming him down, keeping him quiet and compliant until the drugs take hold. Sometimes it's the only thing that works, though, and while Dean knows it can't be good, can't be helping Sam's condition to have Dean here doing this, he's never been able to ignore his brother's pain. Even when it'd be better for them both if he did.

"I'm not tired," Sam protests. "Dean, come on. Talk to me. Tell me what's going on. Why are we here? This isn't right, we're not supposed to--"

The nurse grabs Sam's head out of Dean's hand, wrenches his neck to one side and plunges the needle in, quick and efficient. Sam flinches at its bite and looks at Dean, eyes full of accusation.

"What are you doing to me?" he whispers for Dean alone, confusion melting into anger. "Dean, what the fuck?"

"I'm sorry, Sammy," Dean says, choking on the words, fingers clenching by his sides. "I hate this, you know I do. Sleep, okay? Just sleep."

"Dean, no," Sam slurs, but he's already toppling sideways, unable to stay balanced with his arms constricted and the sedative working in his blood. Dean steadies him, tips Sam's face into his neck for a brief moment until the nurse hauls Sam up and onto the bed.

"It's not wise to allow physical contact," Dr Ellicott says from across the room. "We've talked about this before, Dean."

"I know."

Dean gets to his feet, watching the nurses manhandle Sam into the bed like a sack of potatoes. They leave the straitjacket on, which infuriates him. He wants to tell them to let Sam sleep free, not to pull the covers up so high. Sam doesn't like feeling smothered.

"I'm not happy with you coming down like this all the time, truth be told," the doc continues. "If Sam realises you'll drop everything for him, it'll encourage him to misbehave. He wants your attention, Dean. You need to stop automatically giving it to him."

Dean grits his teeth. He knows the doc is right. Sam's not well; Dean ought to be keeping his distance, not charging down here every time Sam demands to see him.

"He's my brother," he says, and it sounds completely different from when he said it to Cassie. "I've been looking out for him his whole life, especially since our dad died. I can't just switch it off."

"I understand," Dr Ellicott replies. "I do sympathise, Dean. But just think about it, okay? Sam has a much better chance at recovery if we can stop these episodes from happening. If he knows you're not going to come running, his behaviour might stabilise."

Dean doesn't trust himself to answer that in words; pointing out that they called him, that they're happy enough to see him when they need to keep Sam calm, will get him nowhere. They've had that argument before. He gives a short, sharp nod instead, and takes a last look at Sam before he walks out of the room.

The drive home seems to take forever. The apartment is dark, Cassie's annoyance still heavy in the air. Dean sits in the living room with the lights off for fifteen minutes until he can't stand being inside his own head anymore.

There's a warm golden light spilling out of the house on Walker Street. Dean leans against the door for a second, drinking it in, before he lifts his hand to knock.

"Dean?" His mother's eyes are worried as she takes in his weary stance. "Are you okay?"

"Sam freaked out again," Dean replies, sighing. "I had to get down there, help them sedate him. Cassie's pissed at me for going." He looks at her hopefully. "Want some company?"

"Oh, honey." She pulls him into a hug and thence into the house, shutting out the dark. "Come on. I've got beer and ice cream, and there's a Freddy Krueger marathon starting in ten minutes."

Dean laughs into his mother's shoulder and lets her lead him toward the couch, lets her look after him. It helps to ease the guilt, at least for a while.

* * *

When he goes home in the morning, Cassie doesn't mention Sam. The remains of their interrupted dinner are tidied away, and it's as though nothing ever happened. Dean's grateful for that, but he knows there'll be a reckoning later. Cassie doesn't approve of him staying in contact with Sam, and last night was just the first outward sign of an ultimatum Dean can practically smell building in the air.

He's nothing if not an expert at deflection, though, and so he smiles cheerfully and kisses her when he gets out of the shower, and Cassie smiles back and pours his orange juice before she goes to work. Dean breathes a quiet sigh when she's gone, drinks the juice and heads across town to the station.

"Hey, Mandy, welcome back," he greets the dispatch controller when he arrives. "Did you miss me in Atlantic City?"

"Desperately," she deadpans, following him into the back office. "Or, you know, not. Who are you, again?" She smirks at his crestfallen face.

"Ouch," Dean complains, clutching his heart. "That's harsh. Why are you always so cruel to me?"

"Because you love it, you shameless dog. That girlfriend of yours is way too nice to you." Mandy thumps his chest. "Now get your ass to the kitchen. It's your turn to make coffee." She gives him her mug with a bright smile, which gets wider as Dean groans in protest.

"Whatever happened to sexism in the workforce?" he grumbles, shucking his coat across the back of his chair. "I'm a medical professional, for God's sake. Making coffee for admin staff is against the Hippocratic oath."

"Bite me," she tells him sweetly. "And try to actually brew it this time, okay? The stuff you made last time was barely more than water."

Dean remembers the double-strength espresso he'd handed her on the day in question and shudders at the thought of downing anything stronger. He'd had acid reflux for hours afterward. Mandy's in her fifties; the thought of what her stomach lining must be like is almost enough to turn him on to green tea forever.

"Where'd I leave those reports I was writing up the other day?" he calls out on his way to the kitchen. He can hear some of the other guys on shift, horsing around in the locker room, and makes a mental note to look at next week's roster later in the day.

"They're on your desk," Mandy calls back. "I fixed some of your typos for you. Not that you deserve it."

There are days when Dean feels completely superfluous around here. He's a damn good paramedic, but Mandy gives the impression she could do his job with one hand tied behind her back, and that makes Dean nervous. Maybe that's why she does it. She does seem to get a kick out of seeing him on the back foot.

He makes the coffee like he's been told, wincing as the acrid smell of it fills the kitchen. Mandy seems to approve when he brings her mug back, full to the brim, with a mocking little bow. Dean isn't willing to touch the stuff himself. He'll stick with Coke from the fridge and get something drinkable at lunch.

The morning passes quickly in a flurry of paperwork and callouts, nothing too traumatic, for which Dean is grateful. He hates the heavy trauma days. The worst he deals with all morning is an asthmatic toddler whose panicked mother can't find the inhaler--not what he'd call an easy job, not with a whimpering, gasping three-year-old lying limp in his arms, but it could've been worse. Plus, after they get the kid to Memorial he takes the opportunity to stop by the newsroom for a few minutes to see Cassie, and that makes her smile.

Every three or four minutes, he thinks about Sam. His fingers are constantly itching to pick up the phone and call Ellicott, see if he's awake yet, check that he's okay.

Cassie calls him at four-thirty, to see what time he's going to be home. "I'll be done by six," he tells her, and there's no strain in her voice at all when she asks if he can start dinner.

When she gets home, he's got pasta boiling and her favourite basil pesto to have with it, and there's an open bottle of semillon on the counter. Cassie strokes his arm as she picks up her glass, and Dean feels like he's dodged a bullet.

Later, after they've had comfortable sex, Dean lies awake and thinks about Sam. He's still thinking when he follows Cassie into sleep.

* * *

The next day Dean drives out to Riverfront during visiting hours and asks to see Sam.

"That's not a good idea," says a nurse Dean doesn't know, blocking the entryway. "Sam was very unsettled after his last episode. He's calm now, but I'm not sure how he'd react to seeing you. And Dr Ellicott said--"

"Here's the thing," Dean says, and leans in with his most charming grin. "I'm going to see my brother. You can either tell me where he is right now and get out of the way, or you can make a fuss. Then I'll go through you and anyone else I need to and see him anyway. Your choice."

The guy gulps and steps back, away from Dean's forty-pound advantage and barely contained ire.

"He's in the garden out back," he says quickly.

Dean's grin widens. "Thank you."

He finds Sam sitting under an old fig tree, tucked in amongst the root structure like he's a part of it. His brother looks small in the shadow of the tree's immensity, but not fragile. He looks ... thoughtful. There's no sign of the confusion Dean saw in him last time; he appears totally calm.

"Hey, Sammy," Dean says, coming to a stop by Sam's outstretched legs. Sam looks up, assessing the length of him. Dean represses the urge to shift under that watchful gaze.

"Dean. Hey." He tilts his head. "Have a seat."

Dean folds, sitting tailor-fashion on the soft grass. It's a nice day; the sun's bright but not too hot, a slight breeze rustling through the foliage overhead. Sam's only in one layer for once; an old faded t-shirt that Dean thinks used to be his, and the same jeans he's been wearing forever.

"How you doing?" Dean says after a quiet minute, looking at his hands. He tries not to look Sam in the eye too often.

"Pretty good." Sam smiles, a familiar half-quirk of lips. "Sorry about the other night. I was a little ... disoriented."

"S'okay. It happens."

"It happens a lot, doesn't it?" Sam asks. A small frown mars his forehead. "I mean, I don't always remember ..."

"It's fine, Sammy," Dean says quickly. "Don't worry about it. You're not--not worse. It's just when they change your meds, or hell, if you're having a bad day. You don't seem any worse to me, and I ought to know, right?"

Sam examines him for a long moment without speaking. Dean sits still, doesn't even breathe deep. He tries to project an air of confidence he doesn't really feel. Sam's different, and Dean's not sure if that's a good thing, but he'll be damned if he'll let Sam see any doubt.

"I guess so," Sam murmurs at last, and Dean relaxes. "You always did know me better than anyone."

"You're gonna be fine, Sam," Dean says with as much certainty as he can muster. "This thing is just--temporary. A phase or something. You'll work it out, and you'll be out of here before you know it. Everything will go back to normal."

"Normal." Sam huffs a quiet laugh. "Yeah, okay." He doesn't sound convinced, but Dean's so glad to see him rational he doesn't push it.

They sit in companionable silence for a while, and it's like having the old Sam back, before everything went so crazy. If they weren't sitting in the grounds of a psychiatric hospital, Dean could almost fool himself into thinking it was any ordinary day: the two of them sitting in the park shooting the breeze, Dean teasing Sam about his girlfriend, Sam hassling Dean about practicing his kissing techniques on dummies and calling it CPR. Dean wants that back. He misses his brother so much it aches.

"How's stuff at home?" Sam asks eventually. His eyes are closed; Dean lets himself steal a glance before he answers.

"Same old same old," he says. "Mom's doing good. She misses you, said she's coming by to see you on the weekend." Sam twitches, inhales sharply but doesn't speak. "Cassie says hi."

"Tell her I said hi back," Sam replies, without much warmth. Dean nods. He hadn't expected anything more than that. Sam's never liked Cassie. "So--Mom's okay?"

His voice breaks a little on Mom's name. Dean's surprised Sam's asking about her; a warm feeling curls through him at the thought. It's the first sign of interest Sam's shown in either of their parents in years, and he never had much interest to start with. He's always paid more mind to Dean than anyone.

"Yeah. She's thinking of expanding the garage a little, putting in a car wash. Guenther's all for it, too." Dean grins. "I think he's a little sweet on her."

Sam's eyes fly open. "What?"

"Come on, Sam. Mom's a good looking woman, and Dad's been dead a while." Dean shrugs. "Why shouldn't she get a second shot at the brass ring?"

Sam looks like he swallowed a lemon, which is pretty much what Dean was going for. He grins wider and leans back on his hands, raising an eyebrow at Sam's obvious dismay.

"With Guenther?" Sam shakes his head. "I dunno, man. I just don't see it. I mean, I barely remember the guy, but ..."

"He's been pretty good to her. Us too," Dean points out. "He could've left us out in the cold when Dad died, but he made sure Mom got Dad's half of the garage fair and square."

"Yeah, well." Sam's face is vaguely mutinous. "You keep an eye on him, okay?"

"Sure thing," Dean promises--like he wouldn't have done that anyway. Sam's concern for Mom is encouraging, though.

"And, uh, work?" Sam asks after another minute of silence. "How's that going?"

"It's been okay. Mandy's back from vacation. She won twelve hundred bucks at craps and got thrown out of three different places. I think she calls that a win." Dean grins at Sam's bemused expression. "Things are pretty quiet this week--no major accidents, nobody's having strokes or heart attacks or falling off the garage because they think they can fly. I've been doing incident reports and inventory mostly, keeping the meat wagons stocked."

He knows this is leading up to something; like most everything else, Sam's jealous of his job because it takes Dean's focus away from him, but he knows Sam likes that he's an EMT, so Sam doesn't get too bitter about it. It's weird that he's asking outright like this, though.

"Meat wagons?" Sam's face clouds briefly, then clears like a light just went on in his head. "Oh! Right, right. I should've figured you'd ... uh, never mind. That's gross, by the way," he adds, and Dean grins again. "Hey, can I ask you something?"

"You can ask," Dean says cautiously. "I might not answer. You know the rules, dude."

"Don't be stupid." Sam rolls his eyes. "I just wanna know: did you ever think about being a fireman?"

Dean shivers before he can stop himself, gooseflesh breaking out at the thought. He doesn't like fire.

"No," he says. "Blood and guts I can take, no problem. Fire is ... I--no." He shakes his head. "Never."

"S'what I figured." Sam's smile is quick. He nudges Dean companionably. "Doesn't matter. You're still saving people. It's good. I don't know why I'm--"

Sam cuts himself off and chews on his lip for a second, fingers twining restlessly in his lap. Dean sits and waits for him to spit out whatever's really on his mind.

"How long am I gonna be in here?" Sam asks. "I mean--I'm sick, I get that, but there's gotta be some kind of time frame, right? Some kind of, of schedule? I'm sorry--maybe someone told me already and I forgot, but could you fill me in again?"

He looks at Dean through the soft fringe of his bangs, eyes guileless, and Dean crumbles. He's not supposed to talk about Sam's treatment, given he's not exactly detached, but he's not going to brush him off again. Too much of that is what landed Sam here in the first place. If he'd only seen the signs earlier--

"Forty-five days," he says. "You've been here two weeks already, nearly three. And you're doing really well, Sam. I know it probably doesn't feel like it, but you are. Dr Ellicott's just trying to find the right meds to keep you ... balanced, and then it'll just be the therapy until you're better."

"Four more weeks in here?" Sam worries at his thumbnail as he does the math. "No way. I can't."

"Yes, you can," Dean says firmly. "You need this, Sam. You don't want to rush things and end up relapsing, do you? Better to get it right the first time."

"I don't have time for this," Sam argues, sitting upright. "Even if--okay, so things are different here, I get that, but there are still things out there. We need to--we've got work to do, together, and we can't do it if I'm stuck in this place. I gotta get out of here."

Dean's heart sinks. This is the new Sam talking now; eyes darting around everywhere but still focused on Dean, protesting anything that might keep them apart. His hands clench with the effort of not touching his brother, because that will only reinforce Sam's delusions.

"You have to stay here, Sam. The court said so." He sees the shock cross Sam's face and hates himself. "Three more weeks, and then we'll see, okay?"

"No." Sam's chin juts out, arms crossed in refusal. "I'm not staying here, Dean. I don't care who put me in here, I'm getting out."

"I put you in here, Sam. And you're staying," Dean snaps. "If you're wondering why, take a look at yourself right now. You can't be trusted not to hurt yourself, or someone else." He gets to his feet, disappointment bitter in the back of his throat. "I gotta go."

"What--Dean, wait!" Sam stays on the ground, stretches a hand up to him, eyes wide. "I'm sorry, okay? I'm sorry. Stay a little longer, please?"

"No, Sam. It's not good for you." Dean steps away from that hand instead of grabbing it tight. "I'll be back to see you on the weekend, okay? I'll bring Mom."

"Dean!" Sam sounds desperate now, as Dean turns to walk away. "What about the Jeannie? The gin?"

Dean stops, turns back. Sam's leaning forward, hopeful, hand still outstretched. Dean can feel his whole body slump, seeing it.

"I don't know what that means, Sam," he says gently. "I'm sorry, but it doesn't make any sense."

Sam slumps too, falling back against the tree and hitting his head against it with a thud. His eyes close and his mouth twists in what looks like mockery, whether of himself or Dean, Dean doesn't know.

"Of course not," Sam says quietly, as if to himself. "Damn it all to hell."

"I'll be back on Saturday," Dean says. "Be good, Sammy."

He walks away quickly, not daring to look back or listen in case Sam calls out again. There's nothing but heavy silence behind him, though, and somehow that feels worse.

* * *

After he leaves Sam in the hospital, he goes to visit Dad.

It's quiet at this time of day; people are working, shopping, collecting their kids from school. Nobody lingers at any of the gravestones, though as Dean passes down the rows he can see bouquets and wreaths and other offerings that say he's not the only one to come calling today.

He stops in front of the huge slab of granite. Sticks his hands in his pockets and stares at the clean stark lines of his father's name.

"Hey, Dad."

John Winchester's been dead a little over a year, but a lot of the time Dean feels like he's still around. He can recall every look that ever crossed his father's face, every mood he ever showed. He wonders now what Dad would say, if he were here to see what's happened to his sons. Dean's kind of glad for the first time that he isn't.

"So, I guess you heard the news already," he says. "About Sam. Bet you get all the news first in heaven. Must be awesome to know the baseball scores ahead of time, right?"

There's no answer. Nothing but the soft sound of leaves rustling in the breeze. Dean clears his throat, crouches down to clear away a few stray weeds at the edge of the plot.

"He's gonna be okay," he says in a low voice. "He's just a little mixed up right now, is all. Could be a delayed reaction to--to losing you. Could be exam stress. Hell, he could be getting cold feet about Jessica. Point is, he's fine. He'll be fine. This'll all blow over soon and Sam'll be back to normal."

_Sam, lying prone on a hospital gurney, writhing and struggling with all his strength to get free. Eyes locked on Dean, begging through unnoticed tears for him to stop this, Dean, this isn't right, this isn't the way it's supposed to be for us-- and his own hands coming out, pinning Sam's wrist to the gurney and pulling the leather tight._

Dean topples to his ass on the ground, hugging his knees close to his chest. He keeps staring at his father's name through eyes gone blurry with grief and some other, unnamed thing.

"I'm sorry," he whispers, gulping down tears, forcing the words out. "I'm so sorry. You always told me to look out for him, that it was my job to make sure Sammy was okay. I tried, Dad, you know I did. I don't--I don't know what happened. I don't know what I did wrong."

He buries his face in his knees, trying to block out the image of Sam's tears. Trying to ignore the sound of his own.

* * *

For two days, Dean doesn't think about Sam. He throws himself into his work, has feverish, almost rough sex with Cassie, and sleeps like the dead when he's done. He doesn't try to remember his dreams.

On Saturday, half an hour before he's due to pick up Mom, there's a knock at the door. Cassie's not home; she's working late, out covering a five-car pileup on the interstate. Dean's thankful he's been rostered off today; it sounded messy. He mutes _Mission: Impossible_ on the TV and gets up reluctantly.

"Better not be a frickin' Mormon," he mutters under his breath, throwing open the door.

It's not a Mormon.

"Hi, Dean," Jess says, smiling hesitantly at him. "How are you?"

"Jessica." Dean stares for a second, trying to make his brain work. "Um. Hey."

 _What the hell are you doing here?_ he wants to ask, but the words are frozen in his throat, somewhere beneath the disbelief at actually seeing her here. The last time had been a while ago, at New Year's. Not long before Sam was committed.

"Can I come in?" she asks.

Dean steps aside, opening the door wider. He smells her perfume as she passes, light and flowery. Sam wanted to marry this girl. He can understand why. She's perfect for his little brother.

"How've you been, Jess?"

He follows her into the living room, gesturing at the couch. She sits with a smile, tucking her left foot behind her right. Sitting like a lady, his mother likes to say.

"Oh, you know." Her smile turns sad. "Coping. I miss Sam." She gives Dean a look, all liquid eyes and concern. "How's he doing?"

"Good. You know, better." Dean shrugs. "He's gonna be there for a while yet, but we're hopeful."

"Must be horrible for you," Jess says. He can feel the sympathy dripping off her. "Are you doing okay?"

"I'm good. I'm fine." He rubs the back of his neck. "It's all about Sam, not me. I'm just trying to help him get better."

"He's lucky to have you," Jess tells him, and Dean wants to ... he doesn't know what he wants. Except to not have this conversation.

"He's my brother," he says with another shrug.

Nobody ever seems to get what he means by that, except Sam.

"Anyway," he goes on with a completely false smile, "not that it isn't great to see you, but what's the occasion? I thought you were going to Cancún for spring break?"

"I changed my mind," Jess admits. She sits up a little straighter on the couch, twists her purse strap in her hands. "I came out here to see Sam."

Every muscle in Dean's body locks up. Just for an instant, his heart stops beating, and he can feel the utter coldness that death will bring. Then it all stutters, he takes a breath, and the quick release of tension makes him dizzy.

"I see," he says, leaning back against the doorframe. His knees are shaky. "Why?"

"I don't know." It's Jessica's turn to shrug. "I never got closure. When he left, it was so sudden--I didn't even know where he was until your mom called me after he--afterward. I guess I just--I still feel like his girlfriend, you know? I feel like I can't move on."

"Is that what you want?" Dean asks, every sense on high alert, focused utterly on her reaction.

"I don't know. Maybe." Jessica looks up at him, pretty blonde hair framing her earnest heart-shaped face. "I just need to see him, to try and figure it out in my head."

Dean relaxes, trusting the wall to hold him up. His heart is beating rapidly behind his ribs, banging out an uneven rhythm. His palms are sweating.

"I don't think they'll allow it," he says at last, trying to keep his voice even. "It's hard enough for me and Mom to get in to see him. I don't think they'll allow anyone who isn't family."

He doesn't want to wound her. In a perfect world, Sam probably would have proposed to Jessica by now. They were on track for it; Mom pulled Dean aside after she first met Jess at Thanksgiving last year, made him a bet that they'd be engaged by Easter. Dean had taken her up on it. He guesses she owes him twenty bucks now.

Jessica's face crumples, but she doesn't cry. She dabs at her face a bit, preserving her makeup, Dean thinks; when she looks at him again, she's trying to smile.

"I'm not going to give up on him yet," she says, getting to her feet. "There's got to be some way. Will--can I ask a favour, Dean? Will you call the hospital for me; ask them to let me in?"

Dean smiles, pushes away from the door to open it for her.

"Sure," he promises. "Tell you what--I'm heading over there shortly with Mom. I'll talk to Sam's doctor then, okay?"

"Thank you," Jess says. Gratitude flows from every line of her body; Dean can feel it when she hugs him. "Thank you for being there for him like this."

He watches her go, waves and smiles when she turns back at the end of the hall, waits until she gets in the elevator before he closes the door. Only then does he allow himself to think, Where the hell else would I be?

The phone is right by his elbow. Dean picks it up, hits speed dial two.

"Riverfront Psychiatric Hospital," the receptionist says perkily. "How may I help you?"

"Hey, Jamie. It's Dean Winchester," he says. "I've got a question for you."

"Fire away," Jamie replies. "What's up?"

"Nothing, hopefully," Dean says. "Just--okay, look. How much say do I have about who gets to see Sam? I mean--do I get to weigh in, or does Ellicott get the final word, or what?"

"You're Sam's legal guardian while he's in treatment," Jamie says. "I don't know how much weight that holds in relation to visitation, but still. You're his next of kin even without that, so while he's incapacitated you have the ultimate authority--you and Dr Ellicott." She hums thoughtfully. "You can probably override the doctor, unless it would interfere with Sam's treatment."

Dean thinks for a second, biting at his thumbnail. It's a habit he picked up from Sam.

"There's a girl Sam dated at Stanford," he says. "Jessica Moore. She's in town, making noises about wanting to see him. I'd rather she didn't, if that's okay. It might upset him."

"Jessica Moore," Jamie repeats. There's the clacking of a keyboard, scratching of pen on paper. "I'm making a note on his file, and I'll leave a reminder for the night staff. If she calls in, we'll tell her Sam's not seeing anyone except family."

"That's awesome, Jamie. Thanks."

"Not a problem. You coming in to see Sam today?"

"Yeah. Mom's coming too." Dean checks his watch. "I gotta go pick her up right now, actually."

"Okey-dokey." Jamie's smile beams through her voice at him. "See you in a bit."

Dean shrugs into his coat and jingles his keys as he walks to the curb. The Impala purrs under his hands, gliding smoothly through the streets to his mother's house, seeming to harmonise with his quiet humming. It's another gorgeous day.


	2. Chapter 2

Sam looks absolutely stunned to see Mom, like he hasn't seen her in years. Dean's heart leaps as Sam surges up from his seat in the garden and all but smothers her in a hug without hesitation. He looks like he's holding back tears. It's not at all the reaction Dean was expecting--Mom either, from the look of her. Whatever; this is good. The last time Sam touched their mother, he was threatening to kill her. Dean will take what he can get.

"It's good to see you," Sam says in a hoarse voice. "Really good."

He's holding Mom by the shoulders, careful as glass, like she might shatter. She smiles the Mom-smile Dean remembers from childhood and strokes a hand through Sam's tousled hair. Sam smiles back, his mouth trembling, and Dean's fingers twitch. He has the urge to step between his mother and Sam, shield his brother's distress.

"Hey, baby," Mom says softly. Dean can't interpret the look on her face. "Are you okay?"

Sam seems to hover on the verge of breaking down, freaking out, _something_ , for a long minute; when he speaks, it's with a soft laugh, fingering a lock of Mom's hair.

"I've had better days," he says with a shrug. "But I've had worse ones too, you know?"

Mom nods and takes that in stride, looking him over critically. "You're not eating properly."

Dean double-takes, sees that she's right. Sam's collarbones are delicate as bird's wings poking out of his t-shirt; his cheekbones are sharp enough to cut. It makes him look harder, stripped down to the essentials. Dean watches the angles and edges of one elegant wrist for a long moment, considering the strength of it, until he realises what he's doing and looks away.

"Food's not the greatest," Sam admits. "It's not awful," he hastens to add when Dean's head snaps up. "Just, I'm not real hungry lately, and hospital food isn't helping."

"Eat," Dean orders bluntly. "I don't want you falling over every five seconds because you're too dainty to stand up."

Sam shoots him a look of younger-sibling disdain.

"Yessir," he says with an insolent salute. "Eating all my overcooked vegetables from now on, sir."

Dean stifles the urge to smack him upside the head, but only barely.

"Brat," he says instead, and gets a blinding-fast grin he's never seen before.

Sam and Mom start talking, catching each other up--well, more Mom than Sam, since all the stuff he's been doing can be grouped under the one big heading of _Stop Thinking About Dean_ , and Mom's pretty much up to speed on that. She keeps it light, tells them both about her plans for the garage, enthuses about Guenther's input. Dean gives Sam a meaningful look.

"What?" Mom asks, seeing Sam glare at Dean in silent reply. "What's going on?"

"Nothing," Sam says quickly. "Go on--what were you saying about the hydraulic lifts?"

"Uh-uh." Mom flicks her gaze between the two of them, arms folded across her chest. "I think I want to hear what you two aren't saying."

"I told Sam Guenther's sweet on you," Dean tells her, grinning. "He's in denial."

Mom blushes, predictably, and pats Sam's knee.

"Ignore him," she advises. "Your brother's just trying to cause trouble. There's nothing going on with me and Guenther, Sam."

She shoots Dean a stern glance, and he mimes zipping his lips shut, though he doesn't try to wipe the grin off his face. Sam raises an eyebrow, like he doesn't quite believe her, but it's more in jest than accusation. Mom smiles a little bit; Sam grins back at her, and Dean's heart jumps again.

Mom turns the conversation firmly on to other subjects, filling Sam in on the extended family's activities over the past month. Sam listens intently, asking a question now and then--" _Wait, Aunt Jude, she's the one who ..._ "--and nodding like he's taking mental notes when Mom provides the details. It's simultaneously depressing and fascinating to see Sam like this; like he's a complete stranger learning about their lives for the first time, and at the same time, unmistakably _Sam_.

It's difficult for Dean to believe Sam is in here at all, some days. Then the memory comes crashing back in, fresh like it happened yesterday. He keeps thinking that if he'd been paying attention he probably would've seen it coming. This isn't the first breakdown Sam's had; when he was an undergrad, struggling to maintain a four-point-oh in the face of unexpected independence, he'd had a sort of breakdown. It was exam stress that time, Dean remembers, at least on the surface; Sam calling him at all hours, never seeming to sleep, eventually collapsing in the middle of a lecture the week before finals. Dean broke a dozen speed limits getting across the country, but he'd been there when Sam woke up.

He wonders if things would have turned out differently if he didn't always come running when Sam called.

He thinks about Sam's outburst during his last visit, his insistence that he doesn't belong here, the way he'd looked at Dean as if Dean should understand; they've had that conversation before, but this is the first time Dean's seen signs that maybe Sam's got a point. Maybe Sam is getting better. He definitely _looks_ better; smiling and laughing easily with Mom, gaze still flicking over to Dean every few seconds but without the feverish intensity Dean's come to expect. He just looks--normal. Like Sam. And yet not, because this is a Sam he's never seen. If this is what Sam's like when he's normal, the sooner he gets out of here the better, because normal Sam is pretty fucking awesome.

It's nearly sunset by the time Mom runs out of news. The air's getting chilly; Sam shivers when he stands up, gooseflesh clearly visible on his arms and neck. Dean slips out of his coat without thinking and tucks it around his brother's shoulders.

"Thanks," Sam says, looking at him with startled eyes. "It's okay, I've got a sweater inside."

"Keep it." Dean shrugs. "Might give you some street cred--Lord knows you need it, geek."

Sam rolls his eyes, but he slides his arms into the sleeves of the coat and puts his hands in the pockets, clutching handfuls of leather close to his body. Dean files away the mental image of his little brother wearing Dean's coat, the coat that used to belong to Dad, before he clears his throat and leads the way back inside.

Dr Ellicott flags him down as soon as they come through the doors.

"There you are. I was just coming to look for Sam; it's getting close to dinner time. Mrs Winchester, great to see you." The doctor takes in Sam's new acquisition with narrowed eyes. "Dean, may I have a quick word before you go?"

"Sure," Dean says. "I'll see you on Tuesday, Sammy, okay?"

"Tuesday." Sam nods and pulls the coat tighter around him. "Thanks, Dean."

"No thanks necessary. I am just that awesome," Dean tells him, and gets that bright-quick grin again. He files it away with the other and follows Dr Ellicott into his office while Sam says goodbye to Mom.

"What's up?" he asks, taking a seat across the desk. "You need me to sign some more waivers for his meds?"

Dr Ellicott steeples his fingers and frowns.

"I've been thinking about Sam's situation, especially in light of his most recent episode, and I've reached a conclusion," he says. "I don't think it's a good idea for you to be spending so much time with him. He's at a very delicate stage of treatment, and a relapse at this point could be disastrous."

"You ... what?" Dean blinks. "Sam's not unstable anymore. He's just ... confused."

"He's still quite seriously disturbed, Dean," Dr Ellicott corrects him. "Have you forgotten why he's here in the first place?"

"No," Dean admits. "But he's doing better, right? He seems pretty stable to me."

"He's putting on a performance for you, that's why." The doctor leans forward, earnest and sympathetic. "He wants you to think well of him. Part of it is simply a younger sibling seeking the approval of an elder, but the rest ..." He shakes his head. "You know Sam's condition is fragile. His attachment disorder is tightly focused on you, and probably has been for years. I've explained the basics of attachment disorder before; Sam's extremely susceptible to suggestion from you as a result, and his current psychosis would only be making the situation worse. He may be deluding himself right now, especially after you giving him that coat."

He holds up one hand when Dean moves to speak. "I don't doubt your intentions, Dean, and I'm not trying to devalue your relationship with your brother. I'm just trying to point out how his psychosis might cause him to misread things. I have to tell you, I have doubts about Sam's eventual recovery if I allow you to continue visiting him."

Dean feels a wall of panic slam into his chest at those words. For a moment he can't speak, can barely breathe; it's an effort to appear normal under the doctor's watchful gaze. Dean makes sure his hands are lying flat along his thighs, not balled into fists like he wants them to.

"You can't stop me from seeing him," he says carefully, keeping his voice even. "He's my responsibility. I need to make sure he's okay, and that means seeing him from time to time."

"But not quite as often as you have been," Dr Ellicott cuts in neatly. "I think a brief weekly visit on a regular schedule will be much better for Sam, in terms of keeping him on an even keel while his therapy continues. Maybe even less frequent than that. He only has a few weeks left, after all."

"I take it that's a suggestion," Dean replies, still calm, perfectly rational. "It'd take a court order proving Sam's a danger to himself or others to enforce it, and I don't like your chances of getting one. He's not violent anymore."

"Let's hope we don't have to find out," the doctor says. He leans back into his chair and smiles kindly. "I'm not trying to keep you away from him, Dean. I wish you wouldn't see it that way. I'm trying to look out for Sam's best interests."

Dean nods and offers a tight smile, not trusting himself to say any more. He escapes from the office as if chased by a rabid dog, all but frogmarching Mom into the parking lot. It takes him a minute to calm down, suppress the need to go back in there and drag Sam back home where he belongs.

"Dean? You okay?"

Mom's got her worried face on, searching his face for answers. Dean smiles, forces a laugh.

"Yeah, sure. He wanted to talk to me about upping Sam's insurance. Damned doctors, always got their hands out for more while you're bleeding out on the table." He sweeps open the Impala's passenger door and gestures her in with a bow. "Your chariot, milady."

"Idiot," Mom says fondly. She passes a hand over his hair as she gets in. "Let's go to Nick's. I want pizza."

"Great idea. I knew I brought you along for a reason," Dean teases, sliding behind the wheel.

He turns the key in the ignition and revs the engine, jaw clenching as he thinks about Ellicott's thinly veiled threat, consigning it to the depths of _never gonna happen_ just as quickly. He doesn't want to sneak around behind the doctor's back, but if it's a choice between that and not seeing Sam ... well. There are ways to get around visitation limits, and he'll use them if he has to.

* * *

He doesn't go to see Sam on Tuesday. The concession grates, but if it gets Ellicott off his back it'll be worth it. Dean calls Jamie at the reception desk and asks her to pass on a message to Sam.

"Tell him I'm stuck at work," Dean says. "Some staff training I forgot about. I'll come by in a few days."

He has no doubt Ellicott will check to see if he's been there. He kind of hopes the guy chokes on his satisfaction. It doesn't help to know that it's only temporary; the idea of anyone, even Ellicott, interfering with his access to Sam makes Dean want to spit nails.

Later that night Dean gets a call on his cell. The caller ID shows an unfamiliar number, but he answers anyway.

"Staff training?" Sam drawls in his ear. "That's a pretty weak copout, Dean. It's not nice to lie to the mentally ill, you know."

"Sam?" He keeps his voice low, even though he's alone. Cassie's in bed already. "How the hell did you get hold of a phone? And my number, while we're at it? I've only had this one for two weeks."

He'd only changed it because Sam wouldn't stop calling the old one, but he doesn't want to bring that up now.

"Stole a cell," Sam says in an offhand tone. "Broke into the office, looked at my file. It was interesting bedtime reading."

Dean takes the phone away from his ear and looks at it. Sam sounds so _casual_ about what amounts to breaking and entering. It's kind of ... impressive, aside from the part where it freaks him right out of his fucking skin.

"I bet," he says evenly. "Aren't you worried they'll catch you sneaking around?"

"In this place?" Sam snorts. "Not likely. Half the night staff are too busy banging each other and the rest of them are asleep. And the door locks are pathetic. It's not the security keeping the patients in line, it's the medication."

"Which begs the question," Dean says, "why aren't you asleep, Sammy?"

"Stopped taking the meds," Sam says easily.

Dean inhales sharply; it echoes down the line.

"Oh, don't even start," Sam says. "There's nothing _wrong_ with me, Dean. I'm not gonna go postal and come after anyone with a hunting knife."

"That's not exactly the problem, Sam."

"Yeah, well." Sam sighs. "I'm not gonna come after you with a bottle of lube either, okay? I got the message. No means no, even when Dean Winchester says it--which, by the way, I never thought I'd see the day you'd turn down guaranteed sex."

Put like that, Dean feels almost ... guilty.

"Dude. We're _brothers_ ," he points out defensively. "It's not exactly normal, you know?"

"Oh, great. The more things change ..." Sam's irritation comes through loud and clear. "You know what? Screw it. I am not gonna have this argument with you again. Especially not now."

"Good. Let's not." Dean sinks onto the couch, sprawling his legs out wide. "Just--tell me why you called."

"I figured Ellicott said something last week to stop you coming by. I want to know what's going on. There's nothing in my file more recent than last week."

When Dean helped to restrain and drug him, neither of them says.

"There isn't?" Dean frowns. "Aren't doctors supposed to keep file notes about every damn thing that happens?"

"Supposed to. Maybe he fell behind in his notekeeping." Sam's voice is dry. "Come on, spill. What did he say?"

Dean hesitates for a long moment, weighing his options. Then he realises he doesn't really have any; he _wants_ to tell Sam what's going on. Sam's got the right to know what Ellicott's doing--full disclosure, or something.

"He wants me to stop coming down there so often," he confesses. "Says it's detrimental to your recovery." He's starting to think Ellicott might be right; Sam's stealing phones to keep in contact with him, and that's way over the line.

"I figured it was something like that." Sam's opinion of Ellicott's opinion comes through loud and clear. "So you're gonna toe the line, huh? That's not like you, Dean. You love sticking it to authority figures."

"Shut up," Dean says automatically. Sam's dead on target, but he's not going to admit it. "I'm not gonna screw up your therapy, Sam."

"You won't. I'm doing that all by myself." Sam sounds pretty cheerful about it. "You could bust me out, you know. I could use the excitement. It's boring as hell in here when you're not stoned. They don't even have a decent library, and the internet connection sucks."

"Jesus, _shut up_ ," Dean groans, rubbing a hand over his face. "You are seriously fucked in the head, Sam, and I am not supposed to encourage you, remember?"

"My head is fine, and you know it," Sam growls, and wow--that tone is brand-new. Dean sits up a bit straighter, narrows his eyes.

"Sam, c'mon," he starts, but Sam's not listening.

"I'm betting I'm in here because you're the fucking king of denial and you drove me absolutely _crazy_ with it. Literally," Sam says furiously. "No matter where I go, you're always the same. I thought here it'd be--"

He falls silent. Dean listens to him breathing deeply, getting himself back under control. His mind is whirling. Half of what Sam's saying doesn't make sense, but the rest--

"You thought what?" Dean asks finally. "And what do you mean, I'm always the same? The same as what?"

"Nothing. Forget it. I shouldn't have called. I don't even know what I'm doing here." Sam's quieter now. He sounds tired; mood swings take a lot out of a guy. "I'll see you when I see you, Dean. Sleep well."

"Sam, wait--" Dean starts, but he's talking to a dial tone. He hits star-sixty-nine, but the call goes to voicemail. Dean hangs up without leaving a message for Janet. He doesn't think she'd appreciate hearing him swear at Sam for five minutes straight.

He drops his cell on the coffee table and lets his head fall back against the couch. He can almost hear what Ellicott would say right now: that Sam calling him is another desperate bid for attention, a reaction to Dean cancelling his visit. He'd say that Sam's emotionally manipulating Dean to get him feeling like this: guilty, confused and wanting to go to Riverfront right now to get his brother out. But Sam hadn't _sounded_ desperate, or sly, or even particularly upset. He'd been ... curious, mostly. Frustrated when Dean wouldn't talk to him there at the end, but perfectly lucid even without his meds--and he wasn't lying about that. Dean's been able to spot Sam in a lie since he was born.

He ought to call Ellicott, tell him about Sam's nighttime exploits, if only to highlight the lack of proper security in the hospital. Dean picks up his phone again, dials a number.

 _I'll come Thursday_ , he texts. _Act surprised._

_See you then._

It looks impersonal on the screen, the kind of thing strangers or business associates would say. Dean hears Sam saying it in his mind, and he shivers.

* * *

They get a call near the end of Dean's shift on Wednesday that puts a shiver down his spine, for no reason he can explain. It's a guy his own age, maybe a little older, suffering severe bruising and lacerations on his back and thighs. Those are the superficial wounds: the guy's got at least a couple of broken ribs, definitely a dislocated hip and there are obvious signs of violent sexual assault. The patient's unconscious, which Dean thinks is something of a mercy. His wife found him unconscious in bed when she got home from a business trip, and called 911 immediately. God only knows how long the poor guy was lying there.

It's not the injuries that get to Dean--he's seen worse in his time. It's the sense of deliberate, vicious malice that seeps out of every wound along with the blood, like a message. Dean can sense it, but he doesn't know what it means. He doesn't want to.

"Unit Five to Dispatch," he reports, easing the ambulance into traffic while Tony sees to the guy in back. "We've got an unconscious African American male, approximately twenty-five years old, one hundred seventy pounds. Severe contusions to ribs, back, wrists and neck. Possible broken ribs. Suspected dislocation of left hip joint. Signs of anal penetration with resulting lacerations. Heart rate sixty, BP one-ten over seventy. Over."

"Copy that," comes Mandy's crackling voice. "What's your ETA at Memorial?"

"Ten minutes."

Dean slings the radio back in its cradle and flicks on the siren. His skin is crawling. He wants this guy out of his ambulance, fast.

* * *

He wakes up in the middle of the night with his skin still crawling, cold sweat drying on his chest and back. His throat is dry as if he's been yelling, but Cassie's fast asleep beside him.

For some reason he can't name, Dean knows he was dreaming of Sam.

* * *

 

On Thursday, he tells Cassie he's going to the gym after work. He even takes some workout clothes with him, makes a mental note to go for a run before he comes back to the apartment.

"It'll be good for you," Cassie tells him. "You haven't had a decent workout in ages." She tilts her head coyly, eyes sparkling. "Well, not in the _daytime_ , anyway."

Dean musters up a grin, kisses her before he leaves. Drives just a touch too fast to the hospital. He parks half a block away and slips inside when the lobby's momentarily empty. Sam's in the garden again, flat on his back staring up into the fig tree's branches. He's in sweats today, another t-shirt. Dean drops down beside him and nudges his shoulder.

"Who'd you bribe?" Sam asks, nudging Dean back. "You didn't sneak in all the way."

"That big guy, the one with the arms. Scary looking dude. I think he's an orderly."

"Simon." Sam nods. "He's okay. I caught him with one of the nurses night before last." He pauses, smiles a bit. "He's married."

"Leverage. Awesome."

Dean considers how weird this is, thinking about things like blackmail and bribery, and how wrong it _doesn't_ feel. Lying to his girlfriend about visiting his brother, who's so obsessed with Dean he's been committed for it. _Extreme case of attachment disorder resulting in psychosis, with associated suicidal and homicidal tendencies. Patient remanded to Riverfront Psychiatric Hospital for forty-five days under the care of Dr James Ellicott pending review1._ It feels ... ordinary. Like they do this sort of thing all the time.

He wonders if maybe Sam's not the only one who should be in therapy.

"What're you thinking about?" Sam asks.

He looks down, sees Sam watching him. It's the same focus on him that Sam's always shown, but it's calmer now, steadier. It's like Sam's _seeing_ him instead of just looking at him, and the difference is startling.

"You look better," Dean says. "Been eating?"

"Yeah," Sam says with a grin, accepting the evasion. "Turns out the food tastes better when you're not tweaking."

"How are you doing that, anyway?" Dean settles back against the tree, Sam's head next to his hip. "They must watch you take the meds."

"I do take the meds." Sam's grin gets wider. "I just don't keep them down for long."

"Gross." Dean makes a face. "Thanks for that mental image."

"Sharing is caring," Sam says with an angelic expression. "My therapy sessions are teaching me to externalise my feelings."

Dean snorts. "Idiot."

He should be more nervous that Sam's flouting almost every rule this place tries to enforce, and doing it with such apparent ease. The thing is, Sam seems so much _better_ Dean can't bring himself to argue about it. He doesn't know if the therapy is finally kicking in or if Sam's just pulling himself out of whatever emotional hole he fell into, but something's sure as hell working.

They fall into a comfortable silence, Sam's eyes closed now. Dean takes in the other people in the garden, but keeps Sam in his peripheral vision. Sam looks better physically, too; not as pale as he had been, no tremors or twitching, and some of the hollowness is gone from his face. He's still far too thin for a guy his size, though, and Dean doubts he's got half the strength he used to.

"You got a workout room in this place?" he asks.

"Yeah," Sam says. "Think I'm the only one using it. Some of the stuff in there is older than I am. The free weights are okay, but that's about it."

"Let's go take a look," Dean suggests, getting to his feet. "I want to make sure you're not gonna cripple yourself for life on a busted leg press."

Sam mutters something about overprotective older brothers as he leads him to the room, tucked away in a corner of the building overlooking the main entrance. There's a door in the hallway marked "Staff Only"; Sam tells him it leads outside to the staff parking lot. Dean nods, filing away the information, and takes a look at the equipment, mentally discarding most of it as too old or too small.

"You've been doing free weights and crunches?" he asks, hefting a ten-pound dumbbell, and Sam nods. "Good. Maybe add some skipping, since you can't jog in here. I'll get you some ropes."

"What are you, my personal trainer now?" Sam looks amused. "I know what I'm doing, Dean. Been working out for a long time now."

"Not lately. You're pretty much starting from scratch. And it never hurts to get a second opinion from a medical professional." Dean grins when Sam shoots him a look of surprise. "Half an hour every day to start with. You sure you're okay in here by yourself?"

"Yes, Dean. I know how to lift a dumbbell." Sam rolls his eyes. "Not like anyone in here's gonna spot for me, anyway. I'll be fine."

Dean looks him over, judging his fitness level. He doesn't seem frail, exactly, just--underweight. Gangly, when he should be lithe. He probably has zero stamina. Sam has a swimmer's body, long lean legs and slim hips, wide but not heavy through the shoulders. Dean estimates he should be packing thirty pounds more muscle, at least.

"Hey." Sam's voice is warm, amusement edging into something else. "Eyes up here, bro."

He jerks his gaze up, sees Sam watching him again. There's banked heat in Sam's eyes, but he doesn't so much as twitch in Dean's direction. Dean clears his throat, looks away.

"I've got sweats and stuff in the car," he says hesitantly. "You know, if you want some company."

"I wouldn't mind."

Sam's still looking; Dean can feel his gaze like a physical weight. He backs away toward the door, scratching the back of his neck, looking everywhere but at Sam.

"Okay. Good. I'll, uh, be right back."

"I'll be waiting."

Dean ignores the undercurrents in Sam's tone and flees outside.

It actually turns out to be a pretty awesome workout session. Sam's a good training partner, seeming to know instinctively what Dean's limits are and pushing him just a bit past them. Dean's natural competitiveness leads him to put in more effort than usual, and Sam's exhilarated grin, when they finally call it a day, adds an extra lift to Dean's endorphin rush.

"Dude." Sam laughs breathlessly, collapsing into a loose tangle of limbs on the floor. "Drill sergeant much?"

"What can I say?" Dean shrugs, backhands sweat off his brow. "I take after Dad that way."

"Yeah, you do. You remind me of him sometimes."

Sam's smile turns wistful--another first, when speaking of their parents. He grabs the bottom of his t-shirt and wipes his face with it. Dean gets a flash of faded-tan skin, a hint of hipbone above loose sweats. He swallows, looks at the wall when Sam's done.

"I'd better get going," he says. "Cassie wants to go to a movie this afternoon, and I gotta shower."

"Shower here, if you want," Sam offers, stretching his legs out straight and bending over them, hands around his ankles and touching his forehead to his knees. "I'll play lookout."

"Nah," Dean says. "She'll be wondering where I am already. I told her I'd only be an hour."

Sam looks disappointed, but he doesn't argue. Dean's grateful; he's not sure whether he'd be able to refuse if Sam pushed the issue. He's already expecting an earful from Cassie when he gets back. He lingers a few minutes anyway, enjoying Sam's upbeat mood.

"Dude, go," Sam says at last, checking the time. "Unless you _like_ sleeping on the couch."

Dean flips him off as he leaves. He grins as Sam's laughter echoes in the hall behind him.

"Don't worry about it," is all Cassie says when he gets home, smiling at him fondly. "Looks like you needed that."

"I did," Dean agrees. "Might make a habit of it."

Later, at the movies, Cassie's engrossed in the so-called romcom playing out on the big screen (what the hell, Dean thinks; whatever happened to the Jerry Lewis style of romantic comedy?) when he gets another text from Sam. He excuses himself, goes to the men's room.

_Tomorrow, 5.30? Ellicott's golfing._

_OK._

* * *

He hears about three more assaults over the next week. All men; all attacked at night while sleeping in their own beds, behind locked doors. All different ages, different races, different physical types and socio-economic backgrounds. It seems completely random.

That's the thing that worries Dean the most. There's no way for the police to stop the attacks if there's no pattern for them to follow. Which means anyone and everyone is at risk--including Sam.

He mentions it to Sam once, while they're trading off sets of crunches. It's Easter Sunday; the Winchesters aren't huge on religious holidays as a rule, but this one involves chocolate and Sam has a sweet tooth. Dean grins as he thinks of the pound of Godiva truffles in the Impala. He's going to be popular for a whole different reason today.

"I don't like it," Dean says of the attacks, sitting cross-legged by Sam's bent knees. "Someone's running around out there splitting these poor guys in half, leaving them with broken bones and probably years of therapy, and the cops have nothing to go on."

"Nothing?" Sam grunts on one of his raises. "What are the victims saying?"

"Not a damn thing, far as I know." Dean puts his hands around Sam's ankles to keep his feet on the ground. "They're keeping 'em all sedated, on account of whenever they wake up they all start screaming gibberish. The guy I took in said something about ..." He frowns. "I forget. Some African thing. He was pretty out of it, what with all the pain meds. But whoever this asshole is, he's not discriminating. There's four guys in the hospital so far, and they're all different colours." He twists his mouth in a humourless smile. "Aside from the bruising, that is. Purple's one colour they've all got in common now."

Sam finishes his set and curls up into a sitting position, letting his knees fall wide apart to mirror Dean's. He looks at the floor for a minute, frowning as if considering something.

"This guy--it _is_ a guy, you think?" At Dean's nod, Sam continues. "This guy's getting in through locked doors? And nobody hears anything--partners, neighbours, no dogs barking or whatever?"

"Zip, zilch, nada," Dean confirms. "I know a few of the guys at the precinct who're working the case, and they're all saying the same thing. Nobody hears anything or sees anything until the victims arrive at the hospital. It's friggin' spooky."

"Spooky," Sam murmurs. "Yeah." He looks up at Dean, mouth crooked in a half-smile. "Can you keep me in the loop?"

"Sure," Dean agrees, puzzled. "Why are you so interested?"

"Just curious." Sam shrugs. "I haven't seen any news coverage anywhere online. It's a little weird."

"You're hacking the computer network now too?" Dean shakes his head. "Maybe they're right to be worried about you, dude."

He's grinning as he says it; Sam grins back and rises smoothly to his feet, offering Dean a hand.

"Time for your favourite part," he says brightly. "Lunges!"

Dean groans and makes Sam drag him to his feet, the rapist temporarily forgotten.

* * *

The look on Sam's face when Dean gives him the chocolate is the best thing Dean's seen in weeks. His brother's face lights up with almost childlike awe, laced with pure hedonistic greed that makes Dean's heart skip a beat. He's careful not to let their fingers brush when he hands the box over.

" _Dude_ ," Sam breathes, holding it reverently. "What the hell?"

"Happy Easter, Sammy," Dean says. "Now repeat after me: Dean is the awesomest brother on the planet."

"You definitely have your moments," Sam says with a grin. His gaze lingers on Dean a little too long, while he caresses the edges of the box in a way that seems far more sensual than it should. Dean's mouth goes a little dry as he watches Sam's hands.

"You're, uh," he begins, wrenching his eyes away with an effort. "You're gonna let me have some, right?"

"Thought you'd never ask," Sam murmurs. When Dean's head snaps up in shock, Sam's wearing a perfectly innocent expression, stripping the plastic off the box and holding it out to Dean. "You want first choice?"

Dean reaches out numbly and takes a truffle without looking. The rich, slightly bitter taste of the chocolate explodes on his tongue--raspberry, tart and sweet, the velvety texture spreading through his mouth and inviting his knees to give way with the luxury of it. He concedes without argument, folding to sit on the chair by the window, eyes closing involuntarily as he chases every hint of flavour, searching for more. He hears a tiny noise from Sam, like a choked-off moan, and opens his eyes to see Sam sprawled across the bed, the truffle box momentarily abandoned between his thighs.

Sam's fingers are in his mouth, covered in chocolate, and Dean knows what he missed while he was in his own blissed-out state. Sam's a messy eater when it comes to candy: he likes to pull things apart, always bites or licks the chocolate coating off his Snickers before moving on to the stuff inside. He takes his Oreos to pieces and eats the filling first; Dean's never seen him do it any other way.

He knows that Sam has probably spent the last couple of minutes sucking the chocolate shell off his truffle, relishing the subtle dark bite of expensive cocoa, the soft creamy explosion of ganache. He knows that Sam's sweet tooth is pretty much insatiable when it comes to good chocolate, and that Sam is probably as close to orgasmic as it gets right now without actually putting a hand down his pants.

Dean looks at the expression on his brother's face, head tipped back against the wall, tongue curling around two fingers and Sam's free hand searching blindly for the box between his legs; Dean's breath hitches sharply in his chest and a wave of pure heat washes over him.

He has to get out of here. Right now.

"I gotta go," he forces out of a dry throat, sounding hoarse and not caring. "Cassie--"

He couldn't give a fuck about Cassie at the moment, but he has to say _something_. It's enough to snap Sam out of his endorphin daze, at least; he looks up when Dean staggers to his feet, fingers falling wet and glistening out of his mouth. The smell of chocolate is everywhere. Every hair on Dean's body is trying to stand on end.

"Wait," Sam says, sliding to the edge of the bed. "Dean, wait a second--"

He can't wait; he needs to be gone, before--before--

"--take some of these with you," Sam finishes, shoving the box into his stomach. "Seriously, dude, I can't eat all those. I'll go into a sugar coma."

Dean looks stupidly at the chocolate, then up at Sam's face. His brother is gazing quizzically back at him, waiting for Dean to grab the chocolate and run.

There's a dark smear across Sam's lower lip, right near the corner. Dean wonders what flavour it is.

"Cassie likes chocolate, right?" Sam asks, pushing lightly on the box, holding a tissue in his free hand. "Dean, come on, take some."

He scrabbles a hand through the box, dropping half a dozen bite-size pieces of temptation into the tissue. Sam twists it up and hands it to him with a grin and takes the box away possessively.

"Okay. Go away now," he instructs. "Me and my chocolate need some quality time together."

"My chocolate and I," Dean murmurs automatically; he's not thinking about Sam's grammar. He's trying not to think about Sam at all. "I'll, uh. I'll see you."

"Hey."

He makes himself look up, meets Sam's eyes with a hopefully bland expression. Sam's already halfway into another truffle, lips and tongue dark with chocolate, fingertips sinking into the tiny confection in his hand.

"Happy Easter, Dean." Sam smiles at him, wide and soft. "Thank you."

Dean nods jerkily and all but runs to his car.

He ignores the chocolate on the passenger seat all the way home, praying silently that Cassie won't be there. For once, someone Upstairs is paying attention: the apartment is quiet when he stumbles inside. Dean throws the chocolate on the couch, all but falls down next to it with his legs sprawled wide, one hand going for his belt while the other seeks and finds a truffle. Chocolate fills his senses at the same time his hand finds his dick, and Dean chokes on a moan. It's the headiest sensation he's ever experienced; sweetness and cream and spice in his mouth, heat and slick pre-come on his dick, the driving calluses on his hands sliding rough over sensitive skin while his tongue curls up in his mouth.

An image of Sam flashes through his mind, head tilted in enjoyment, long neck on display, long fingers delving into the shadowed depths of the box for more. That's all it takes; a few strokes, no more, and Dean is arching up and into his hand, biting down hard on his tongue and grunting as the sharp sweet tang of blood clashes with the smoothness of the chocolate and the musky, bitter scent of his orgasm fills the air.

He's still lying there in pieces, trying not to think, when the door rattles, opens, and Cassie walks in.

"Oh my _God_ ," she blurts out, stopping dead. "Dean, what are you _doing_?"

Even in the middle of freaking out, Dean thinks that's a pretty stupid question.

"Um," he says, reaching frantically for tissues, trying to get his jeans zipped up. "Nothing?"

"Yeah, right." Cassie wrinkles her nose at him. "You know what? I don't even want to know. Just--clean it up, okay?"

"Sure. Yeah. Right now," Dean agrees hastily. "Sorry. I, uh." He shrugs awkwardly, leftover heat and embarrassment ( _guiltshamewant_ ) making him feel clumsy. "I just--"

"I don't want to know," Cassie repeats, and tosses a roll of paper towels at him. "Men and animals, I swear to God ..."

Dean cleans up the mess he made and doesn't say another word. He hides the remaining chocolate in the pocket of his coat, and pretends he's going to forget about it.

* * *

He hears of two more attacks in the next few days, and--more worringly--a second attack on the guy he'd taken in, right there in the hospital. No-one heard or saw anything, again, and the patient was so traumatised this time the staff aren't even pretending to let him wake up. Nobody's saying anything, but they're all thinking the same thing: this is no ordinary sick freak. This guy is fucking _scary_.

Dean shoves the whole mess into a box in his mind--one that keeps getting fuller by the day--and does his best to forget it. When Sam asks him about new developments in the case, he shrugs and says he hasn't heard a thing.

* * *

They fall into a pattern, meeting to work out almost every day. Dean buys Sam a new SIM card for his stolen phone with enough credit to last a month. Sam tells Dean about the security crackdown in the hospital after one of the other patients was caught rifling through the administrator's desk.

"Damn lucky it wasn't you," Dean says, huffing as he bench-presses two hundred pounds.

"Luck's got nothing to do with it. I'm just good," Sam corrects him with a grin. "Come on, two more. Channel your inner Hulk."

They've matched their visits to Simon's schedule, Dean slipping him twenty bucks now and then so Ellicott doesn't find out. It's been two weeks, and officially he's only gone to see Sam once. He passes Ellicott in the lobby on his way out that time, and gets a patronising nod that makes his hackles rise.

He spends a lot of time trying not to think about what he's doing, what _they're_ doing, and what will happen if anyone else finds out. Whenever the subject rears its ugly head in his mind, he reminds himself how much more stable Sam is, how he's sleeping and eating and rapidly gaining muscle. They're in daily contact, text messages and the odd clandestine phone call just to check in, and it's--normal. Sam hasn't made a single move on him. The other stuff, the things Dean finds himself doing, thinking, when he's alone ... it's nothing. It's fine. Things are fine.

It's nothing like the way Sam was before.

* * *

_"Dean?" Sam sounds frantic. "Dean, talk to me, please."_

_This is the fifth time Sam's called tonight. The first time or two Dean thought he was drunk-dialing him, but it's not funny anymore. Dean stops fondling Cassie when he hears Sam's voice on the line, taking his hand away from her breast. She looks at him questioningly; he mouths, 'Sam again,' and rolls his eyes._

_"Sam, dude. What is the matter with you?" he asks. "You gotta stop calling like this all the time. Get a life, bro. Go find that pretty girlfriend of yours."_

_"I don't want her," Sam all but whines, emphasis on the 'her'. "I want to see you, Dean. I don't like being away from you."_

_"College is hard, huh," Dean says. Sam misses him; the idea brings a smile to his lips, into his voice. "Don't worry, kiddo. Spring break's in what, two weeks? It's not that far away."_

_"I don't want to wait." Sam's gone from whining to mulish. "Need to see you_ now _. I can't do this without you."_

_"C'mon, Sammy." Dean frowns at the desperation in Sam's voice. "You're studying too hard, man. Take a break, have a beer or a joint or something. You sound a little freaky."_

_Sam sighs heavily in his ear, muffled and wet like he's crying. Dean's eyebrows go up; Sam hates tears._

_"You don't get it," Sam tells him, voice breaking. "I can't do this anymore, Dean. The calls, the emails, they're--it's not enough. I gotta be where you are. I can't--I don't know what I'll do if I can't see you. I need to see you."_

_This is getting way beyond a joke. Dean's honestly worried now; Sam's not sounding at all like himself. He wonders if his brother's had an actual breakdown, or if he's just outrageously drunk, or what._

_"Okay, Sammy," he says, low and gentle. "Just take it easy. Don't flip out or anything, okay? You know where to find me, dude. I'm not going anywhere."_

_"You promise?" Sam asks, pathetically hopeful like a four-year-old begging for sweets. "You'll be there when I come for you?"_

_"I'll be right here," Dean says, ignoring the phrasing. "Get some sleep, little brother. You sound like you could use it."_

_"Okay. Okay." Sniffling, then rustling as if Sam's wiped his nose on his sleeve. "G'night, Dean. I'll--you'll really be there?"_

_"I'll really be here," Dean repeats. "Sleep, Sammy. I'll see you soon."_

_"Soon," Sam agrees, and the line goes dead._

_"Okay, that was weird." Dean stares at the phone for a minute, then shrugs. "Too much studying, I guess."_

_"Is he okay?" Cassie asks._

_"I don't know. He sounded pretty out of it." Dean frowns again, rubbing at his mouth. "Maybe I should go out there, bring him back early."_

_"If you're that worried, sure," she says, but she doesn't sound like she agrees. Dean thinks about it for a minute._

_"I'll sleep on it," he decides. "Give him a call tomorrow, see how he's doing then. Maybe he's just had one too many creme de menthes."_

_"Good idea." Cassie smiles and tucks herself back against his side, pulling his arm around her again. "Now, where were we?"_

_Dean smiles and leans into her kiss; in his head, he can still hear Sam._

__

* * *

When he calls Sam the next morning, it goes straight to voicemail. Sam's message-voice is bright and happy, the exact opposite of how he sounded last night. Dean hangs up without saying anything.

He waits half an hour and tries again. Nothing.

By midmorning Dean's seriously concerned. He's been calling Sam at regular intervals with no reply. He calls directory assistance in Palo Alto to try and get Jessica's cell number, but she's not listed. When he calls their home line, nobody answers.

The minute he hangs up, his phone rings. It's Mom.

"Dean?" She sounds upset. "Have you heard from Sam today?"

"Not today," he says. "He called a few times last night, sounded pretty whacked-out. I've been trying to get hold of him all morning. What's up?" A horrible idea forms in his mind. "He's not hurt, is he?"

"No. No, he's--there hasn't been an accident, or anything," she says, and Dean breathes a sigh of relief. "He's okay, physically."

"'Physically'? What does that mean?" Dean demands.

"He's here. He came to see me." Mom's voice is shaky, like she's been crying. "He was yelling, wanting to know where you were, why you weren't waiting for him like you'd promised. He accused me of keeping you away from him, and ... other stuff. He threatened _me, Dean."_

_Dean winces. Sam and Mom's relationship isn't exactly close. He can imagine the parts she's not telling him._

_"Where is he now?"_

_"I don't know." Mom takes a shuddering breath. "He left about twenty minutes ago. Said he was going to find you, no matter what it took. It--he wasn't very coherent, but ... he scared me. He was almost wild--I didn't dare try to stop him."_

_Dean's about to reply when he hears a commotion outside. He walks to the front door of the station house, sees a group of the guys embroiled in a fight of some sort._

_"Mom, I gotta go," he says. "Something's going on outside. Try to calm down. I'll call you back when I find Sam, okay?"_

_He hangs up and tucks the phone in his pocket, hurtling outside at a full run. The knot of people is moving like a rugby scrum, flowing back and forth between the row of parked ambulances and the street._

_"Hey!" Dean bellows, forcing his way into the mêlée. "Break it up, fellas!"_

_"Dean!" he hears, and has a moment to recognise Sam's voice before the other bodies melt away. "Dean, you_ bastard _, you promised!"_

 _He doesn't get time to do more than draw breath; the next thing he knows, he's flat on his back on the ground with a crying Sam sprawled on top of him, babbling nonsense into his neck. Then Sam's_ kissing _him, open-mouthed and wet, and Dean has absolutely no idea what the fuck is going on. He can't get free; Sam's body is trapping his arms between them and Sam's holding his face, elbows planted solidly on either side of his head. Dean has exactly zero space to move, he can't catch his breath, and all the while his brother's tongue is doing its damnedest to get right down his throat. Sam's hips are grinding in little hitches, pressing him down; Dean scissors his legs to free himself, but Sam's legs are pinning his knees wide, and his feet can't get a grip on the concrete._

_"Dean," Sam breathes into the kiss, chest heaving. "Dean. I couldn't--I had to--Dean. Just. Oh, God, Dean, please. I'm gonna--Dean, I need--I can't, not without you, I'll die without you, I--she said you wouldn't, but you will, you have to or I'll--"_

_He leans in to take Dean's mouth again, but never gets the chance. Two of the guys pull him off Dean bodily, throwing him down on the ground and pinning his arms and legs. Sam twists and writhes in their hold, spitting curses, eyes fixed on Dean._

_"Dean," he pleads, like it's the only word he knows. "Please. I need you. Please. I don't wanna live without you."_

_Dean gets to his feet, lightheaded and breathless. He can still feel the imprint of Sam's lips, tastes him in his mouth, on his tongue. He can't meet Sam's eyes._

_"I called Memorial," Mandy says quietly, coming up beside him. "They'll have a room set up in the psych ward in ten minutes. Cops are on their way."_

_They're the longest ten minutes of Dean's life._

* * *

  
1 See Sam's involuntary committal paperwork [HERE](http://pics.livejournal.com/heidi8/pic/000fak9h.jpg). Back to fic


	3. Chapter 3

Two events bring their quiet arrangement to a halt: Sam gets caught in his nighttime wandering, and Cassie goes to the gym.

Dean figured it would be only a matter of time before someone noticed something or Sam slipped up. That's why it's always Sam contacting Dean, and not the other way around; if Sam doesn't call or text, Dean doesn't go near the hospital. When three days pass with no contact from Sam, Dean's pretty sure something's up. 

He gets a call from the hospital on the fourth day, telling him Sam's movements have been restricted due to 'prohibited activities', which he takes to mean that Sam's been caught snooping somewhere he shouldn't, or someone's found his stolen phone. He hopes Sam's been erasing the call and text logs, then wonders when Sam's paranoia started to rub off on him. In any event, he's not too worried; Sam will find a way to get hold of him, or Dean will go to Riverfront and tell Ellicott to shove his restricted visits up his sympathetic ass.

Cassie, though. Cassie is the real problem. She comes home that evening with a face like thunder, stalking through the door and slamming it after her. Dean's in the kitchen making dinner; he nearly drops a colander full of vegetables at the noise.

"Who is she?" she demands, throwing her shoulder bag on the couch, hands splayed on hips. "Who the hell are you seeing behind my back?"

"What? Nobody," Dean says, startled. He puts down the colander, wipes his hands on a dishtowel. "What are you talking about?"

"I went by the gym today," Cassie says, glaring. "Thought I might try for a joint membership discount, since you've been getting so much out of it. They told me your membership expired a month ago. You never renewed it."

"Uh," Dean says, thinking fast. "Right. Well, I--"

"Don't bother," Cassie cuts in. "I don't want to hear your excuses, Dean. I just want to know who she is. Is it someone at the hospital? If it is, I swear to God--"

"There is no she!" Dean throws the dishtowel in the sink, his own anger rising. "We've been together for three years, Cassie. I have never been unfaithful to you. How about a little trust, huh?"

She wilts under his gaze, all the fury melting out of her, leaving only confusion behind. Dean shoves away the memory of Easter Sunday and the days that followed, and how he can't even look at chocolate now without getting hard.

"What is it, then?" she asks, shrugging helplessly. "Why all the secrecy, Dean? What have you been doing?"

He doesn't want to tell her. He wants to claim he's been working late, doing charity work, taking long walks by the river to find himself. He hasn't mentioned Sam to her in days, and she hasn't asked. Things are a lot less stressful that way.

"Sam," he says at last, unwilling to lie. "I've been visiting Sam."

Cassie stares at him, her mouth opening and closing in apparent shock. Dean stands his ground and waits for her to say something.

"But," she manages at last. "Dr Ellicott said it wasn't helping. You told me that. You were supposed to stop going down there."

Dean struggles to formulate a reply that she'll understand, one that makes sense outside his own head. He doesn't know how to tell her that it's more about him wanting to see Sam than the other way around.

"He's my brother," he says at last. "He needs me."

"Yeah, right." Cassie snorts. "He needs you. Dean, he doesn't need you. He wants you, more than he wants his own girlfriend, and you're the only one who can't see it. Or you don't want to." She sighs, runs a hand through her hair. There are new lines on her face Dean's never seen before. "Sometimes I think you're as obsessed as he is."

Dean reels back, stunned at the accusation; it's his turn to gape like a landed fish. Cassie watches him with a resigned look on her face, like the idea isn't new to her.

"Forget it," she says when he tries to speak. "I don't want to hear any more lies, Dean. Just--figure it out, okay? I can't live like this."

She goes into the bathroom and closes the door behind her. The snick of the lock sounds ominously final.

* * *

She's wrong. She doesn't get it. In Sam's mind, Dean's all he has; he can't just walk away from that. He can't walk away from Sam.

He won't.

That night he dreams of rats rustling in the nonexistent roof, smells a scent so pungent it makes his eyes water even in sleep. He wakes up at two a.m. with his face shoved into the pillows, drenched in sweat, feeling like someone's dropped an anvil on his back. There's an ache somewhere deep inside him that he doesn't want to name. Cassie sleeps on beside him, undisturbed. 

It's just a dream. It doesn't mean anything.

Dean gets a blanket from the hall closet and spends the rest of the night huddled on the sofa, staring blindly at the wall.

* * *

Jessica tracks him down the next day.

It's the end of his shift; he's heading for the parking lot behind the station, nothing much on his mind except stopping by to see Sam--this is the fourth day of radio silence, and he wants to know what's going on. When he looks up, she's just _there_ , leaning against the Impala like it's hers to touch.

"Hey, Jessica," he says, trying for casual. "Didn't know you were back in town. How're you doing?"

"Screw you, Dean," she almost spits at him. "What do you care?"

"Whoa, hey!" Dean stops walking, puts one hand up. "What's wrong?"

"I went to the hospital yesterday to see Sam." Jessica's gaze matches her voice: ice cold. "I've been calling every couple of days, but they wouldn't even let me talk to him. So I flew back over. They wouldn't let me in."

Dean swallows down his surge of triumph.

"I asked to speak to Sam's doctor," Jess goes on. "He wasn't there, but they took my number and said he'd call me."

"Uh-huh." Dean scratches a hand through his hair. His mouth is dry. "Ellicott's a busy man, Jess. It might take a few days, maybe a week--" _He's working hard on getting his golf handicap below five. Sam and I are really supportive of his efforts._

"I got off the phone with him half an hour ago." Jessica's smile is a twisted replica of the real thing. "He was very surprised to learn I've been trying so hard to see Sam without success. We had a nice long chat about that. I'd tell you the highlights, but you can probably guess how it went."

Dean drops his eyes, avoiding her accusing gaze. His heart speeds up a little. He wants to tell her to get away from his car.

"Jess--" he starts. "Listen, it's not as bad as it seems, all right? I wasn't trying to--I just thought--"

"Don't bother," she says sharply. "I don't want to hear it. It's all a crock anyway." She pushes away from the Impala, steps into Dean's personal space. "Do you even know why you did it, or are you repressing that too?"

"I thought it would upset him," Dean insists. "He was so antagonistic about everything to do with California, I just ... I thought it would be best not to remind him. That's all it was, I swear."

"And you couldn't tell me that because ...?" Jessica prompts. When Dean shrugs helplessly, she barks a short, unamused laugh. "Yeah, that's what I thought. Just say it, Dean. You don't want me anywhere near your brother, and this gave you the perfect excuse."

Dean gapes at her. "I--what?"

"I don't know why it took me so long to figure it out." Jess shakes her head. "You were always a little too close to him, even before he--before this happened."

"He's my brother," Dean says through gritted teeth. "I practically raised him--our mom nearly checked out after her miscarriage, and she had post-natal depression on top of that--I had to look after him. He depended on me. Of course we're close!"

"He slept in your bed until he was ten," Jessica snaps. "He wouldn't let either of your parents near him when you weren't around. He used to call you a dozen times a day. Damn it, he wouldn't even sleep with me until I got your seal of approval! That's not normal, Dean."

"It's none of your fucking business," Dean snarls, pushed to the edge of things he doesn't want to be thinking about. He takes a step forward, satisfaction welling up when she backs away. "I was all he had--Mom was zoned on antidepressants half the time, Dad crawled into a bottle of Jack and didn't come out for two years. He was a baby. They would've taken us away, separated us. I wouldn't ever have seen him again." It's Dean's turn to laugh, bitter and harsh. "You couldn't possibly understand."

"I couldn't," she agrees. She's still backing off, like she doesn't want to run the risk of touching him. "And I don't want to, if this is what it does to you." She studies him for a moment. "I called the hospital just now, before you came outside. You know what Sam said when they told him I was on the line?"

Her face crumples for the briefest of moments.

"He said, 'That's not true. Jessica's dead.' And then he asked for you."

Dean feels sick. Under that, there's a layer of shock, so thick as to almost completely blot out the warm flood of victory in the pit of his stomach. He pushes it away, unwilling to think about it while Jess is still here.

"He's confused," he says. "Call him back, get him on the phone this time. Maybe he'll snap out of it when he hears you."

"It doesn't matter," Jessica replies wearily. "He doesn't want me. He doesn't want anything except to be with you. I get it now. It took a while, but it's finally sunk in." She looks Dean up and down, her expression unreadable. "I never could compete with you, not really. Guess I should've seen it coming."

She stands there for a moment, looking at him expectantly. Dean watches her watching him and doesn't say a word. He doesn't know what she's waiting for.

"God, you're even more screwed up than he is, aren't you?" Jessica says finally. Dean recognises pity in her tone.

"I don't know what you're talking about," he tells her, taking a step back. "Sam's the one who's sick."

"Sure, Dean." Jessica turns to go. "You keep telling yourself that."

She disappears around the corner of the building, blonde hair lifting in the breeze. Dean waits until she's out of sight before he lets himself slump against the car. 

Her last words stick in his mind, replaying on a loop that he can't switch off. His knees give out and he slides to the ground, legs splayed out awkwardly in front of him while her voice echoes over and over in his head.

\-- _more screwed up than he is_ \--

\-- _don't want me anywhere near your brother_ \--

\-- _even know why you did it, or are you repressing that too?_

He went out to California once, about six months after Sam left for college. Six months after he made Sam leave, because nobody in their right minds turns down a full ride to Stanford, no matter what Sam said about wanting to stay close to home. Dean took an impromptu road trip, drove halfway across the country in two days to see how Sam was doing. When he got there, he'd found Sam by accident, mixing cocktails at a club not three blocks away from his motel. Dean had stopped in for a quick drink, entirely by chance; when he got inside and saw Sam there, laughing at someone else's jokes and sliding bottles through his hands with a lover's touch, Dean turned around and left without a word. He found a liquor store, bought a fifth of Jack and stayed drunk until he'd forgotten why he came.

He'd smiled when he got home, told Mom and Dad that Sam was fine, he'd settled in and made friends and everything was peachy. He thinks it even might have been, for a while. Until Sam started calling him on the flimsiest of pretexts, and Dean always picked up no matter what. Always ready to help his little brother out with homesickness or studying or just to talk late at night, Cassie asleep in the bedroom, Dean sprawled out on the couch with a beer in hand feeling Sam's laughter deep in his bones.

Sam, strapped flat on a gurney begging Dean to help him. Sam trussed up in a straitjacket burrowing his face into Dean's knee. Sam huddled in the depths of Dean's leather jacket, clutching it like a lifeline. Sam doing pushups in an abandoned weights room, sweat gleaming on his forehead and neck and shoulders, darkening the ends of his hair. Sam's voice, warm and curling inside him, bright smile breaking over his face.

Sam, desperate and clinging and wanton, heavy welcome weight pushing him into the ground. Sam's lips burning wherever they touch, hands setting off a chain reaction that goes from body to heart to soul. Dean's mind shutting it off, burying it deep, incapable of saying no to Sam but unable to cross that barrier. Until now.

Dean struggles to his knees and stares at his reflection in the side mirror, watches the blood drain from his face, pupils contracting as the shock takes hold. He's hard, painfully so; he mouths Sam's name, and his cock twitches in response. His stomach roils in warning; he barely has time to move to the side before his body rebels against his epiphany, sour acid burning his throat as much as the realisation is searing his mind. Dean gags on the taste and spits, but it lingers on his tongue.

He fishes numbly for his keys, slides behind the wheel and stares at nothing through the windshield for long minutes. He doesn't know what to do. He knows what he wants to do: go to Sam, right now, and tell him he was right. About everything.

 _And then what?_ the sane part of his mind asks. _Get adjoining padded cells? I bet Ellicott would love to have a matching set of Winchesters to study. Probably get himself another doctorate out of it._

The thought makes his blood run cold. He can't risk that happening. He has to keep his mouth shut, pretend nothing's different, else Sam will pick up on it. Sam won't stay in the hospital if he knows Dean is on the outside wanting him, and Dean won't refuse his brother. Not anymore.

Just picturing the look on their mother's face if she ever finds out makes Dean want to die.

In two weeks Sam's case will be reviewed, and if he passes muster they'll let him out. After that it'll be harder for Ellicott to keep tabs on them, and maybe then ... maybe they can talk about it. Or--something.

Dean takes a deep breath and turns the key in the ignition. He can do this. He's good at repressing, apparently. Only difference this time is that he actually knows what he's doing.

* * *

The next time Sam calls him, it's the middle of the night and Dean's sleeping on the couch, in the aftermath of another fight with Cassie. The glow of late-night infomercials on the TV creates eerie shadows on the walls. Dean's deep in slumber when the soft purr of his phone shatters the quiet, limbs heavy and languid as he struggles into awareness. His entire body feels bruised, battered, used; when he tries to recall his dream, there's only a stuttering memory of leathery wings and a single, glaring eye. Stupid vampire movies, messing with his mind.

""H'lo?" he slurs into the phone, eyes still closed. "Sam, s'at you?"

"Dean?" Sam's whispering, urgency clear in his tone. "Dean, wake up. I gotta make this quick."

"Mm," Dean hums. He shifts onto his side, wincing as sore ribs protest. "M'listening."

"I got caught," Sam reports. "They took my phone and put a watchdog on me. I had to use the friggin' Vulcan neck pinch to get past the guy."

Dean smiles, snuggles deeper into the couch. "S'good, Sammy. Smart."

"It's ridiculous," Sam growls back. "I gotta get out of here, Dean. I'm not crazy, but this place is gonna make me crazy if I stay here much longer."

"Be over soon." Dean stifles a yawn with his hand, lets it fall limply back to the couch. "One more week."

"I don't know if I can wait that long."

Dean hums again; he's not really listening to the words, just floating on the sound of Sam's voice, deep and quiet. He's exhausted; all he wants to do is sleep, and Sam's baritone is soothing.

"Dean?" Sam's tone sharpens, drawing him back to the surface. "Dean, are you okay?"

"Tired." Dean yawns again, sighs into the phone. "Middle o' the night, Sam. Need sleep, 'kay?"

"Yeah." Sam waits a beat, then adds, "Don't come by for a while, okay? Wait a couple days."

"Mm-hm," Dean agrees. "Okay, Sammy."

Sam laughs, soft husky chuckles that warm the entire length of Dean's spine.

"Should catch you asleep more often," he teases. "You're cute."

"Shaddup." He swallows back the rest of what he wants to say, remembers he can't talk to Sam like that. Not now. Not yet. "Catch a man when he's tired, can't expect sparkling conversation."

"Go to sleep," Sam tells him. "See you soon, okay?"

"'Kay," Dean agrees again. "Miss you, Sam."

"Yeah," Sam breathes quietly. "Miss you too, Dean."

He hangs up; Dean lets the phone fall onto the floor, already slipping back into dreams.

* * *

When he wakes up, he's slept the clock around and his body's covered in bruises that weren't there yesterday. It hurts when he stretches, bends, or sits down. He remembers hot breath in his ear, burning him, a rasping voice screeching demands he doesn't understand.

* * *

The third time it happens, he steals a bottle of prescription tranquilisers from the pharmacy at Memorial. He doesn't think anyone sees him doing it, but at this point he doesn't really care. He just wants to sleep without dreaming.

* * *

Dean spends so much time buried in sleep over the next week he forgets what day it is. He's on leave from work, playing the delayed stress card, living on bad coffee and donuts from the bakery on the corner. Cassie's not around much; he thinks she's sleeping somewhere else now. He gets a call from the hospital--something about coming in to sign more authorisations for treatment--and that reminds him he needs to leave the apartment, at least for a while. He has to go see Sam. It's the only thing that motivates him to get out of bed.

He nearly trips over the stack of unopened mail near the door, stares at the Impala for a good five minutes before he can figure out how to start her up. It's an effort to concentrate on the road, remember all the things he's supposed to do when he's driving. It takes him forty minutes to get to the hospital, because he gets lost twice on the way.

Sam's not in the garden this time. It's raining or something--not that he noticed--so everyone's being kept inside. Sam elected to stay in his room; one of the orderlies shows Dean the way, giving him quizzical looks all the while. Dean wonders if the guy's checking him out. Big dude, arms like hams. He thinks maybe he's seen him before, but he can't remember where.

"Dean!" Sam looks up from his book when the door opens, a smile breaking over his face. "Dude, finally, what took you so--"

He stops dead, mouth open, and stares at Dean. Dean stares back blankly. Sam looks kind of pale. And hot. Dean remembers that: he thinks Sam's hot. It's the first pleasant thought he's had in a while.

"Everything okay?" the orderly asks, cautious hand on Dean's arm.

"Sure," Dean says around a yawn. "We're good. Right, Sam?"

Sam starts, jerks back into motion. "Yeah," he says hastily, smiling at the big dude. "We're fine. Thanks, Simon."

"I'll be right outside," Simon tells them.

Dean waits for the door to close, then leans back against it and shuts his eyes. He's cold.

"Dean," Sam breathes, flowing silent and graceful across the room to put his hands on Dean's face. Long fingers cradle his jaw, slide down to grip his shoulders in a solid, unshakeable hold. It feels good. "You're soaking wet, man. And you look ... oh my God."

He cracks one eye open, sees a look of horror on Sam's face. "What? What's wrong?"

"What's wrong?" Sam asks, eyes wide. "Dean, you look like hell. Did you even notice it's raining? Are you stoned?"

At least that explains why he's cold. Though he supposes it hasn't been raining for ... however long he's felt like this. It hurts to think about it; he'd rather go back to bed, though that idea hurts too, makes him twitch and shy away.

"Been sleeping plenty." Dean shrugs. "Havin' some weird dreams, though." He digs into his pocket, brings out a little amber bottle. "Got some friends here to help with that."

Sam takes the bottle out of his hand and reads the label. He goes even paler, if that's possible.

"Ambien," he says, disbelief clear on his face. "Dean, where did you get these?"

"Think you're the only one who knows how to sneak around a hospital?" Dean smirks at him, then flails for support when his knees suddenly give way. Sam gets a hand under his arm, braces him against the wall without apparent effort. 

"Whoops." Dean looks down, whistles in appreciation. "All that working out's done you good, Sam. You're holding me up one-handed. Wow. That's kind of hot."

"This is bad," Sam says, ignoring him. His hands travel over Dean's body, stopping when Dean flinches. He lifts Dean's shirt, inhales sharply. "This is really fucking bad, Dean," and Dean doesn't really know what Sam means by that--he can't think when he's so tired--but he thinks from the look on Sam's face that his little brother needs to calm down.

"Don't worry," he says, grinning lazily, eyes closing again. "S'nothing. Just a bit tired, that's all. Work's been kicking my ass."

"This is not just you being tired, Dean." Sam's voice is grim as he eases Dean over to the bed and sits him down. "What the hell have you been doing?"

"Weird dreams," Dean says again, struggling half-heartedly to get out of Sam's grip. "S'nothing, Sammy. Don't go all caveman on me."

This seems to make Sam even more worried, which Dean thinks is completely ass-backward. He tries to focus, makes himself sit upright and opens his eyes all the way.

"M'fine," he says reassuringly, patting his brother's knee, leaving his hand there. "It's delayed stress or something, dude. It'll pass."

Sam's mouth tightens into a thin flat line. He gets up, pulls Dean to his feet and across the room to the window. Stands behind him, their reflections thin and ghost-like against silvery streaks of rain. Dean shudders at the feel of Sam back there, twitches away from his looming presence at the same time he leans toward it.

"Stress and dreams don't do this," Sam says, and pulls Dean's sodden t-shirt up around his chest.

For a second, Dean doesn't know what he's getting at. He can't see anything in the window, only Sam's hands framing his body, which is a really nice fucking image. Then his eyes sharpen, and he sees; seeing, he also feels, and all at once his comfortable hazy barrier of fatigue is ripped away.

Bruises ring and layer his body, old and new, a riot of colour from green and yellow to purple and fresh, bright red, everywhere he can see. He turns, trying to look at his back; it's just the same, some areas darkening to black where the blood has pooled under his skin. His wrists are braceleted with raw, angry weals, as if he's been gripped and held for hours, and there are matching marks on the back of his neck. He tries to swallow, realises it hurts.

Dean stares, and then he sways, his body reeling in shock. Sam catches him, runs a hand down his side, over his ass, and Dean can't help it--he jerks like Sam stuck a knife in him. 

He remembers now. The pills don't just send him to sleep--they stop the dreams.

"Dean." Sam's voice is a low growl. "Tell me what's going on. You said there hadn't been any more attacks, and now you turn up looking like a textbook case? What the hell?"

Dean shakes his head, steps away. Moves toward the bed, then has second thoughts and leans against the wall instead. Sam's narrowed gaze follows him, making Dean feel like a bug under a microscope. Like a witness Sam's examining. Like a victim.

"Stop looking at me like that," he snaps. "I'm fine."

"Yeah. Sure you are," Sam says dryly, mirroring Dean's pose against the opposite wall. "And the moon really is made of cheese. Give me a fucking break, Dean. You're so beat to hell you can barely walk, it's a good bet you've been ..." He hesitates, doesn't actually say it, for which Dean is forever grateful. "And you're so stoned on sleeping pills I'm amazed you got here in one piece. Doesn't any of that tell you maybe something is oh, I don't know-- _wrong_?"

Dean doesn't answer. He can't say, _Yeah, Sam, something's wrong. I've been having these fucked-up nightmares where I'm facedown on the bed and there's something awful holding me down, whispering horrible things in my ear. It smells bad and it hurts, and when I wake up in the morning my throat is raw from screaming_ \--because that will make it real.

"Let it go," is all he says, looking straight at Sam. "I mean it, man."

Sam snorts and pushes off the wall. Dean tenses, but Sam doesn't come near him; he heads over to the closet instead, pulling out the old duffel bag Dean packed for him months ago.

"What are you doing?"

"What's it look like, genius?" Sam brushes past him, pulls out the top drawer of the tallboy. "I'm coming home with you."

 _Yes. Come home with me. Nobody'll know, we can just get in the car and drive_ \--

He shakes his head, dispelling the thought. _Can't think about that. Not yet._

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. You can't." Dean straightens up, ignoring the pain it costs him. "You gotta stay here. You're still--you've got, what, four days until your review?"

"I don't give a rat's ass about my damn review," Sam shoots back, dumping the drawer's contents into the bag, shirts and socks flying everywhere. "I'm not staying here when you're under attack from some spirit or creature or God knows what, Dean! The only reason I stayed here in the first place was so I could convince you I wasn't crazy. Do things right. Be normal."

"You stayed in a psych hospital to convince me you aren't insane?" Dean echoes Sam's snort. "Good call. Not."

"Worked, didn't it?" Sam pauses in his packing, shoots him a look, eyebrow raised.

For a single, endless moment Dean stares at his brother, taking him in from sparkling, sane, lucid eyes and eternally messy hair to broad shoulders and lean limbs, standing tall and easy in front of him. For a single, endless moment he wants to step forward and press himself along the length of all that Sam, just to see, finally. Just to know.

_Shit. Shitshitshit. Can't do this. Can't let him--he's safe here. Gotta keep him safe. And then, brief and clear, He won't be safe if he comes with me._

"It's backfiring pretty bad right now." Dean slides along the wall toward the door, keeping his eyes on Sam, making his voice hard. "Look, dude, I know you're worried, and I appreciate it. It's making me all warm and fuzzy inside. But you can't leave here. I've been bending the rules, letting you run around without telling anyone, sneaking in when I shouldn't, but this--Sam, you can't. They catch you, you'll never get out again." He feels the edge of the jamb, hinges at his back, gets his hand on the doorknob. _Can't let it have him_. "I won't let you."

He's got Sam's full attention now; Sam's circling the bed, coming to stand in front of him, close enough to touch. Dean's heart triphammers in his chest; he can't meet Sam's eyes. Not if he wants to look at himself in a mirror ever again.

"Won't let me?" Sam repeats. "Hate to break it to you, Dean, but it's not up to you."

"Sorry, Sammy." Dean forces a smirk, turns the knob. "I got a court order that says it is. And I'm telling you: you're staying, even if I gotta watch 'em strap you down."

"Dean!" Sam lunges for the door, but Dean's already sliding through it, gasping as his bruised ribs shriek in protest. There's a thud as Sam hits the door and starts heaving it back open. "Dean, don't you fucking dare! Dean!"

He jerks his head at Simon, straining to get the door closed despite Sam pulling it back the other way. Simon lends his muscle, slips a key into the lock as soon as the latch clicks. Sam thumps against the door again, swearing in what sounds like five different languages.

"Don't do this, Dean," he says through the steel, voice muffled. "Don't make me come after you."

Dean holds back a shudder. It surprises him how much he wants Sam to do just that, but he can't. They can't. Sam's got to stay here. Dean's not clear on a lot just now, but he knows that much.

"Don't let him out," he says to Simon. "I fucked up, coming to see him. I thought it'd be okay. I thought it was helping."

"Obviously not," Simon says, tilting his head toward Sam's door.

"Obviously." Dean runs a hand over his face, shoves away everything he's feeling. "Just--keep an eye on him, okay? For real."

Simon gives him an insolent salute and twirls his keyring around one finger. Dean suppresses the urge to sucker punch him, and turns on his heel to leave. He's tired; all he wants to do is go back into that room and pull Sam down on the bed with him.

He pops another sleeping pill in the car so he doesn't have to think about it. By the time he gets home he's woozy, stumbling from the elevator to the front door. It takes him endless minutes to get his key in the lock; once inside, he sways on his feet for a while before he realises something's different. 

All of Cassie's stuff is gone.

There's a note on the nightstand next to the bed. Dean knocks it to the floor when he tries to pick it up. He leaves it there, too tired to care right now. Besides, he's pretty sure he already knows what it says. He doesn't want to hear another one of Cassie's diatribes, even if it's on paper. All he wants is to sleep and to not think of Sammy. He collapses onto the mattress, still fully clothed, and lets the swirling darkness drag him under.

* * *

Pain. Endless, tearing pain like nothing he's ever known. Ripping him apart, splitting him open like overripe fruit, crushing pressure bearing down at neck and hip and wrist. There's an acrid smell in the air, like charred bones, and a maddening rustling in his ears. One of his hands is free, trapped between his cheek and the pillow he's suffocating in; he flails around, batting weakly at cold leathery skin, but he can't find purchase, can't concentrate through the spikes of agony inside. He struggles for breath, bucks uselessly under the weight, and opens his mouth to scream.

_"Ithhab ya ayoha al shaitan al laseen. Okhroj min hatha al badan al tahir, allathi hawwaltaho ila thalamin asawdon b afa’alik wa afkarika alsawada’a. Ithab anta wa kol sihron lamasa hatha al badan al abyad."_

Dean reels at the sudden freedom in his limbs. Air whooshes into his lungs, making him dizzy; he rolls over in panic and then stops dead, staring at officially the weirdest sight he's ever laid eyes on.

There's a _thing_ crouched at the end of the bed, snarling in a voice that makes the hair on the back of Dean's neck stand up. It's about four feet tall, twisted and hunched with wicked curved talons and holy fuck, the thing looks like a fucking bat, up to and including the wings. Then it shifts, hissing something in a language Dean doesn't recognise; he catches sight of the single eye and the huge, dripping penis between its legs, and his entire being recoils in horror.

He tears his eyes away and looks to the doorway. Sam's standing there in Dean's leather jacket with a gun in one hand and a metal canister at his feet, eyes fixed on the creature. He repeats the foreign-sounding phrases in a precise, measured rhythm, moving steadily forward, until he's right in front of the thing with the barrel of the gun pressed against its head.

The creature seems to be frozen in place. It hisses again, its face a rictus of hatred, something unintelligible but vicious all the same. Sam's mouth curls in a smile equally vicious as he gently squeezes the trigger. 

Dean flinches at the sound of the shot and stares at the blood, thick and dark, spraying across the walls, the sheets, Sam's face. The corpse makes a hollow thud when it topples to the floor.

"Dean." Sam's there in the next moment, kneeling on the bed, hands reaching out to cup his jaw. "Dean, say something. Are you okay?"

He shies away from the touch, scooting back against the headboard, trying to pull his jeans back over his hips. Sam drops his hands. The smell of cordite hangs heavy in the air.

"Dean?"

"What the hell, Sam?" He scrubs a hand over his face. "I mean--what the fucking hell?"

"It's called Popobawa. It's a demon," Sam says quietly, looking at his hands. The gun lies on the bloodstained sheets; he picks it up, tucks it away out of sight under his shirt. "An East African version of the Mara. Legend says it was a djinn that turned to demonic ways. Pretty recent, too--the earliest accounts of Popobawa only date back to the early seventies." His mouth quirks in a half-grin. "Dad's journal is a a gold mine of useful information. Once I realised what it was, figuring out how to kill it was easy. Makes sense when you think about it."

Dean stares at him. He has no idea what to say. He wants to say that Sam is crazy, spouting nonsense about demons and journals and carrying around a fucking gun, for God's sake, and what the hell is he even doing here at all--but then he sees the tip of a wing poking up over the edge of the bed, and Dean gives up altogether.

"Sammy," he says helplessly, and a second later Sam's hugging the breath right out of him, smelling of foul blood and sweat and gunpowder and Sam. Dean's got him wrapped up just as tight, though, so he doesn't think he can complain.

"You okay?" Sam asks again after a minute. His breath ghosts over the back of Dean's neck; the hairs there rise up again, for an entirely different reason.

"Yeah, I think so." 

Dean loosens his death grip on Sam's waist with a frown, leans back a little, twists from side to side. There's no pain, no physical sign of the stabbing, clawing torment he's been suffering for days. His ribs don't even twinge in protest.

"Huh." Dean shifts, testing his body. "Okay, that's bizarre."

"What is?" Sam frowns, watching him. "Should you be doing that? You might have internal injuries or something."

"Nah, I'm good. That's what's strange." 

Dean lifts up his shirt and peers in confusion at the unmarred, healthy flesh of his abdomen. Sam makes a sound and pushes back the cuffs and then the collar of the shirt, showing nothing but smooth freckled skin over muscle and bone. His hand clenches in the material, pulling it tight over Dean's shoulders and neck, and he stares at Dean in confusion.

"Don't look at me, dude," Dean says with a shrug. "You're the one with all the freaky demonic know-how."

"I've never heard of this happening before," Sam murmurs. His thumb rubs in small circles over Dean's collarbone. "I saw what you looked like; those wounds should still exist. Unless it was something to do with the demon's power while you were in the dream-state, or--"

He stops then, shakes his head and frowns, and Dean rolls his eyes in disgust.

"You are the weirdest person on the planet," he announces, whacking Sam on the back of the head. "Who cares, dude? The demon thing is dead, I don't look like a piece of abstract modern art--can't we just call it good?"

"Yeah." Sam sighs, squeezes Dean's shoulder. "Yeah, sure. Sorry." 

He's still frowning, a tiny line etched between his eyebrows that Dean's seen a million times before. It means Sam's going to worry at whatever's bothering him until and unless something else comes along to distract him.

"Hey." He pokes Sam right in the middle of that frown. "Want to tell me what the hell you're doing here? I mean, not that I'm not grateful or anything, but ..." He waves a hand around. "Last time I saw you, you were, you know. Locked up."

"Oh. Right." Sam smiles a little bit. "I kind of broke out."

"Kind of," Dean repeats. "Meaning what, exactly?"

"Meaning I waited till the night shift started, picked the lock on my door and gave my watchdog a little love tap to keep him quiet," Sam replies. "Then I got online, did a little research to find out what was attacking you." He shrugs. "Once I Googled 'demon' and 'bruised ribs', it was pretty easy to narrow it down. I remembered what you said, about the victim who claimed it had to do with an African tribal thing, and that helped. There are news reports on Popo Bawa as recent as 2005."

"And then you just ... what, walked out the front door?" Dean asks, half in admiration. "Man, I appreciate your style, but this is the first place they'll come looking once they realise you're gone. You know that, right?"

"Uh, yeah." Sam looks at him like he might be a little dim. "Which is why I don't plan on being here very long."

"Where are you planning on being?"

"I don't know. Somewhere out of town." Sam shrugs again, disturbingly casual. "Doesn't really matter."

"Beg to differ, but it really kind of does." Dean sits up straighter. "I'm not gonna let you run around by yourself."

"Dean." Sam grins at him, eyes sparkling with humour. "I went to college all by myself when I was eighteen, remember?"

"Yeah, and look how well that turned out," Dean shoots back without thinking. "You can't be trusted on your own, Sammy."

Sam gazes at him, a wry curve to his mouth that makes Dean ache somewhere deep inside.

"You could always come with me," he says softly. "I wouldn't mind."

Sam's hand is still on his shoulder. Dean can feel the tension humming in his brother's body from that single simple touch, the want and need that sent Sam over some mental abyss two months or twenty years ago. There's a look in Sam's eyes that Dean has seen before. He's seen it at other times, when Sam's gaze has lingered on him a little too long. He saw it yesterday in the mirror.

The moment stretches, crystallises; Sam's smile hooks, turns sad, and he takes his hand away.

Dean reaches out and makes a grab for it--and misses.

He overbalances spectacularly, falling face-first into Sam's neck, narrowly avoids smashing his nose into Sam's chin. Sam rocks back under the impact, hands at Dean's shoulders trying to push him upright, away.

"You are the biggest klutz ever, I swear to God," Sam huffs, and then Dean makes another grab for his face. This time he doesn't miss.

Sam stares at him, mouth open, eyes wide and questioning. Dean takes the deepest breath of his entire life and walks out to the edge of the abyss.

"Okay," he says. "You and me, Sam. Okay."

* * *

Sam just keeps on staring for what seems like an eternity, until Dean starts to wonder if he'd only imagined speaking. Just when he thinks he's made a massive idiot of himself and now would be a really good time to go crawl under a rock and forget about proposing to maybe enter into an incestuous relationship with his _certifiably insane brother_ , Sam blinks.

"What?" he says, like he doesn't get it. Dean sighs.

"I said, okay," he repeats. "It's an expression of agreement. Means 'yes'. I don't know, Sam, I thought for sure you would've heard it bef--"

He doesn't get to finish his sentence, because that's when Sam tries to kiss him. In point of fact, Sam leans in so fast he does some overbalancing of his own, making Dean fall back and crack his head against the headboard. Sam's lips collide with Dean's jaw and slide off altogether, and Dean lets out a grunt of pain that has Sam backing off like Dean's on fire.

"Oh, jeez. Sorry," he breathes, hand out like he wants to touch Dean but doesn't dare. "Too much too fast, right? God, of course you don't want, especially after--sorry, I'll--you tell me, okay, Dean? Tell me what's okay, and I'll--"

"Oh my God, shut up," Dean growls, and fists one hand in Sam's shirt, yanking him in.

He doesn't think about the dreams that weren't dreams, the ripping snarling pain or the panicked trapped feeling, pinned under something terrible, unable to get away. This isn't about that. This is Sam, and there are no comparisons to make.

It's awkward and messy and completely unlike anything Dean's ever done before. He's had a lot of sex; he's not exactly Casanova, but he knows what an erogenous zone is and what to do when he finds one. Sam, though--it's a whole new ball game with Sam. They're rolling around on the bed, grabbing at shirts and fisting hair and teeth clacking every time they kiss, fucking _demon blood_ all over them from the sheets, and if it were anyone else Dean would've already called the whole thing off by now. But it's Sam's legs tangling with his own, Sam's hair getting in his eyes and mouth, Sam's hands holding him so tight he's gonna end up with bruises after all, and apparently that makes all the difference. Dean's more frustrated and irritated than he's ever been in bed--but he's hard as a rock and every time he touches Sam's bare skin he feels like his head's about to blow clean off his shoulders.

Sam's on his back underneath Dean, trying to twist his way out of his clothes and kiss Dean's neck at the same time. His elbow jerks dangerously close to Dean's face as he tugs his way out of a sleeve; Dean mutters under his breath and pushes Sam flat on the bed, drawing his knees up to straddle Sam's hips.

"Stay still," he grunts, and pops all the snaps on Sam's shirt. 

Sam goes boneless under him, letting Dean strip him bare of cotton and denim and leather until there's nothing but air covering him. He watches Dean with half-lidded eyes, lips parted and cheeks flushed in a way that makes Dean think of other ways to raise colour on his skin. He puts a hand on Sam's chest, over his heart, rakes his nails softly down.

"How long?" he asks, watching Sam's face, seeing his breathing get even shorter, limbs twitching as he tries not to move. "How long have you wanted--"

 _This_ , he wants to say. _Me. Us_. But he can't put it into words, even with Sam sprawled out naked in front of him. Naming it, even in generic terms, means putting a limit on it, giving it rules, boundaries, a basis for comparison. He doesn't want any of that to apply to him and Sam. They are _them_ , and they're gonna do this together. That's all that matters.

"Are you gonna call me a woman if I say 'forever'?" Sam says, grinning up at him.

"Bet your ass," Dean says, and wraps a hand around Sam's cock.

Sam melts into it, arching and flexing with every stroke, gripping Dean's hips and grinding up into his hand. Dean's fascinated by the display, starts teasing with a swipe of his thumb over the head now and then, feathering his fingers over Sam's balls. Sam lets him play, responds to every move Dean makes with sighs and gasps and wordless begging for more, and Dean really cannot fucking handle that. He can't touch Sam's cock and watch Sam's face and not want to explode from the sheer want he sees there. It's too much, and not enough, and so Dean closes his eyes and slides down Sam's body and tastes what he's been dying to touch for days. Months. Forever.

The noise Sam makes when Dean's mouth closes over his cock is something caught between a whimper and a growl. He bucks once, hips tense and restless; Dean spreads his hands over the narrow span of his pelvis and holds him down, leaving red handprints when he moves. When he opens his eyes he sees one of Sam's hands clenched into a fist in the sheets, trembling, knuckles white with strain. He closes his eyes again, sucks Sam deeper, harder, and nearly chokes when Sam grabs his shoulders and drags him back up the bed.

"Get these off," Sam breathes into his mouth, nipping at Dean's bottom lip as he tugs at his clothes, snaking a hand beneath denim to fondle Dean's cock. "Want to suck you, Dean, wanna sixty-nine, yeah?" and okay, Dean clearly needs to be naked right now.

He pulls away from Sam's mouth long enough to strip, sending his jeans and black cotton flying over the side of the bed. Sam lies there jerking himself with slow, lazy strokes while he waits; when Dean comes back to loom over him on all fours, Sam brings his free hand up to Dean's neck, pulling him down into a heated, wet tonguefuck of a kiss.

"Turn around," he says. "Want to taste you."

Dean's already moving, shifting to hover over Sam's widespread thighs with his hips tilted toward Sam's face. He fits his mouth around Sam's cock at the same time Sam takes him in, and the sensation of sucking and being sucked blows his fucking mind. Sam's moaning, vibrations from his voice travelling through Dean's cock and up his spine, sparking off nerve endings all the way. He hums in approval, tonguing the spot beneath the head of Sam's cock, and gets the same thing back an instant later. Dean does his best to grin around his mouthful; he knows this game. Sam always loved to play copycat.

It becomes a competition, a drawn-out exchange of licks, bites and slow, wet sucks designed to drive each other crazy. Dean loses track of everything that isn't Sam. He forgets about the demon corpse lying on the floor; the hospital staff who will doubtless be calling the police at any minute to send them out on a manhunt; the very real danger that they will be caught and locked up in separate padded cells if they go through with this insane plan. He knows only Sam's cock in his mouth, Sam's mouth on him, the slip-slide of their bodies brushing and the overwhelming need for more.

"Dean," Sam gasps, half warning, half plea, and Dean stops fucking around, plants his elbows outside Sam's hips and goes for it, settling as far down onto Sam's cock as he can go. He feels Sam's mouth slip away from him, hears Sam whimper and grunt, and gets in two, maybe three more good hard sucks. Then Sam's fingers are digging into his hip and ass and he's coming straight down Dean's throat with a wordless cry. Dean eases him through it with soft licks, pulling off before it gets to be too much, and shifts around to lie with his head on Sam's stomach, one arm flung over his hips.

"Hey," he says, grinning up at Sam. "We having fun or what?"

"Not quite," Sam says, chest heaving, and rolls Dean over onto his back. "I wasn't finished."

Dean gets a momentary twinge of vulnerability, flat on his back with Sam looming over him, but it passes when Sam licks a trail his sternum all the way to his cock. Then Sam's mouth is back on him, taking him deep, and Dean can't do anything but arch and watch Sam suck him like he's never wanted anything else. When Sam opens his eyes and looks up at him, cheeks hollowed and tongue sliding out to tease along the side of his cock, Dean realises that maybe he hasn't.

"Sam," he whispers, and Sam makes a noise deep in his throat that has Dean pulling out and coming in quick hard pulses all over his brother's face. Marking his territory. Staking his claim.

"You are so gross," Sam tells him, wiping his hand across his face. "No more bad porn for you, dude."

Dean's about to argue, but then Sam slowly and thoroughly licks Dean's come off his fingers one by one, tongue curling and flicking so provocatively Dean can feel his cock twitch.

"You love it," he says, stretching wide across the bed. "Now go get me a beer."

Sam kisses his stomach. "Get your own fucking beer," he says, and sprawls out next to him.

* * *

He wakes up wrapped around Sam, arms and legs tangled up so close he can't tell which limbs are his. Sam's face is tucked into his neck, hair tickling his skin, and the room smells like a slaughterhouse. Dean leans to look over the edge of the bed and makes a face at the sight of the demon's corpse, wrinkled and shrunken in the light of day. He can't believe he was so terrified of the damn thing.

They need to have a conversation about that. How Sam apparently knows how to kill demons, and how long it's been going on. Dean's actually kind of looking forward to it. Sam as a demon hunter is somehow not as weird as it should be, and way hotter than just about anything else he can think of right now.

Sam mutters and shifts against him, stretching out his legs and sprawling across Dean's chest. Dean lets Sam manhandle him in his sleep, raising an eyebrow when they end up with Sam straddling him, nuzzling into his shoulder while he rocks his ass against Dean's cock.

"Hey." He turns his face in, kisses Sam into wakefulness. "Don't I even get a 'good morning' before you try to take advantage of me? Dude, I know I'm hot, but there are rules."

Sam blinks sleepily at him, gaze clearing in about half a second flat when he realises what he's doing. He tries to back off, but Dean's got hold of his face in both hands and he's not letting go.

"Sorry," Sam murmurs, going still above him. He presses their foreheads together. "I was dreaming."

"Must've been a pretty good dream," Dean says with a smirk, and yelps when Sam pinches his ass. "Ow! Watch the merchandise."

"I saved your merchandise last night, remember?" Sam smirks back at him. "It's mine now. I can do what I want with it." He runs a hand over the spot he pinched, caressing; Dean flinches in response, and Sam blinks and curses quietly.

"I," Dean starts, but Sam shakes his head, eyes turned down.

"Sorry," he says again, more seriously this time. "I didn't mean ..."

"Yeah, yeah." Dean tips his chin up for a kiss. "It happened, I'll deal with it, we'll move on. Let's just skip over all the angsting, okay? Better things to do." 

He arches up, rubbing his cock against Sam's ass to demonstrate, and grins when Sam's laugh turns into a moan.

"Better places to do it, too," he adds, running his hands over Sam's belly and ass. "You got anywhere in particular in mind?"

Sam grinds down hard for a moment, pulling all the breath out of him; while Dean's gasping for breath, Sam reaches for his hand and sucks two of Dean's fingers into his mouth.

"South Dakota," he says, letting Dean's fingers slide away all spit-slick and shiny. "There's someone I want you to meet."

Dean's barely listening, doesn't care about some stranger in South Dakota. Sam's guiding his hand around and leaning forward, tilting his hips so that Dean can rub his wet fingers along the puckered flesh there, moaning again when Dean slips them inside. He leans up and takes Sam's mouth, pushes with tongue and fingers at the same time, feels Sam jerk in response and smiles into the kiss.

Sam jerks again, a noise escaping him that Dean doesn't like. He pulls away, grips Sam's shoulders in alarm. Sam's lurching like a fish on the end of a line, thrown forward and back in what looks like a convulsion. Dean scrambles up and gets his knees under him, trying to lay Sam down until the seizure or whatever it is passes.

"Sammy?" He tries to get a grip on Sam's head, stop him thrashing around so much. "Sam, can you hear me? Breathe, Sam, okay? Don't fight it. Just let it happen."

"Don't--want--to," Sam grits out from between clenched teeth. He tosses his head again, one wild eye catching Dean's through tangled hair. "Not leaving, Dean. Don't--don't make me, want to _stay_ , help me--"

Dean's hands slip off, like Sam's suddenly unreachable. He can't hold him, can't lay so much as a finger on him. It's like Sam's right there, but he can't get through. He falls back in shock as Sam starts to flicker like a bad TV signal, dropping in and out of view.

"Sam," he says, panicking despite himself. "Sam, come on, come back, man. Whatever's going on, forget about it. You come on back to me. Sam? Sam! _Sam!_ "

* * *

THERE

Sam flops limply, arms stretched over his head and his feet barely dragging the floor. He can't lift his head, barely has the strength to blink and focus on what's in front of him.

Dean's there, one hand holding him steady while the other reaches up with a knife. Sam falls into his arms a moment later as the rope stringing him up gives way. He looks over Dean's shoulder, sees the body of the djinn lying sprawled out on the floor with Sam's silver knife sticking out of its chest.

"Hey," Dean's saying to him, easing him down to stand on his own two feet. "You okay? You hearing me? Sam, say something."

Sam licks dry lips, winces as the movement tears something in his neck. Dean curses and presses a hand to the spot, brings it away wet with blood.

"We gotta get you to a hospital," he says, and Sam can't help but laugh. It's a silent, husky huff of air, but it gets his point across. Dean stares at him in confusion. Sam remembers waking up this morning (this other morning, not the real one--how long has it been?), feeling Dean's fingers inside him, and he wants to cry.

"It was all a dream," Sam rasps, and lets his head fall onto Dean's shoulder. "God."

"Dude," Dean says, clearly worried and trying to hide it. "What the hell? You have some kind of nightmare, or something?"

Sam rolls his head to the side, finds the energy somewhere to lift it up and look Dean in the face.

"Or something," he sighs, blinking to clear his blurry vision. "What day is it?"

"It's been eighteen hours," Dean says neutrally. "Took me a while to find you. I traced your phone's GPS. The djinn had you in some kind of coma, draining your blood. Guess this is the price you pay for having your wish come true. No wonder nobody mentions it in the stories."

Sam nods tiredly. He wants to cling to Dean, wants his hands on him. It's much worse than it used to be. He tries to hold on to the details of the dream--Mom, Ellicott, the Popobawa, Dean--but he's too weak to focus. His head throbs dully when he tries to concentrate.

"Come on. We'll go find a doctor," Dean says, and gets an arm around his waist, Sam's arm slung over his shoulder. "So you dreamed, huh? What'd you dream about?"

"Utopia. Eternal happy place. You were a paramedic, Mom was alive, and I was committed to a psych ward. It was everything I ever wanted. You were about to fuck me when you woke me up." Sam laughs again, hysterical and not caring. "God, Dean, why did you wake me up?"

Dean's confusion turns to horror, disbelief, and Sam pulls away, supports himself against the wall.

"We'd better go," he says quietly. "I don't feel so good."

* * *

EPILOGUE: ELSEWHERE

Sam grins at him across the roof of the Impala, the early morning breeze tousling his hair. He looks different outside in the light of day, like the Sam he used to be. Dean doesn't know if it's his imagination or if something really has happened to change Sam over the past few weeks. He just knows that Sam came back to him, isn't leaving again, and if they go anywhere they're going together.

He hasn't told Mom, didn't even leave a note, no email, no voicemail message. He tried to, but the thought of her finding out like that--from either of them, ever--just, no. If that makes him a coward, so be it. Besides, he thinks she'll piece things together pretty quickly if she ever talks to Jessica again. Maybe some day, they'll ... but no. He knows that's a lie even as he thinks it. There's no going back from this, and Mom won't be able to move past it. None of them can. But for him and Sam, this is the end of the road anyway.

"Got everything?"

Dean opens the driver's side door, twirls his keys around his finger.

"Everything that matters."

He sends Sam's grin back across to him and slides behind the wheel. A moment later Sam's door slams shut and the Impala's engine roars to life.

It's the end of this road, but there's a whole new one waiting for them out there.

END

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Arabic verse used to defeat the demon is translated as follows:
> 
> Leave oh damned devil  
> Get of this pure body that you turned to a black night due to your black deeds and thoughts  
> Leave with every magic that has touched this white body
> 
> Thanks to layne67 for the suggestion.


End file.
